Publications

Financial and press releases

Bergisch Gladbach, 17 May 2023

INDUS holds physical Annual Shareholders’ Meeting

- Great support for PARKOUR perform strategy update
- Dividend payment of EUR 0.80 per share resolved
- Shareholder representatives on the Supervisory Board newly elected

About 61 percent of the share capital were represented at today’s Annual Shareholders’ Meeting of INDUS Holding AG at Koelnmesse’s Congress Centre North. INDUS had intentionally chosen the physical format for its Annual Shareholders’ Meeting to promote the personal exchange. “We appreciate this format of direct discussion with our shareholders,” said INDUS CEO Dr. Johannes Schmidt. “We will definitely stick to this format also in the future.”

In his speech, Dr. Schmidt emphasized: “Our focus was on finding out where the best opportunities for INDUS’ future lie. And how we could make the most of them. The result is our strategy update PARKOUR perform.”

“With our three new segments, we are focusing on what we do best – highly specialized industrial technology,” Schmidt explained. “We want to invest our energy in the future. So far, we were primarily a broadly positioned long-term financial investor – with five segments. Now, we are operating as a holding company with a clearly defined techno­logical focus – with three segments.”

All agenda items adopted by a large majority

In all voting items on the agenda, a large majority of the shareholders approved the proposals made by the Board of Management and the Supervisory Board. Their actions were fully approved and the dividend proposal was accepted. The Board of Management and the Supervisory Board proposed a dividend of EUR 0.80 per share to the shareholders (EUR 1.05 in the previous year), which represents a dividend yield of 3.6%. It was thus resolved to distribute a total amount of EUR 21.5 million. In spite of the difficult market environment caused by the consequences of COVID-19, the war and the high inflation, INDUS Group’s continuing operations generated sales of approx. EUR 1.80 billion and EBIT of EUR 133.7 million in the financial year 2022.

In addition, the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting appointed PricewaterhouseCoopers GmbH, Wirtschaftsprüfungsgesellschaft, Frankfurt am Main, as auditors of the financial statements and consolidated financial statements for the financial year 2023. The compensation report for the financial year 2022 was approved. To ensure that the company maintains maximum flexibility, the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting authorized the Board of Management to issue bonds with warrants, convertible and profit-participating bonds as well as profit-sharing rights or combinations of these instruments with the option of excluding subscription rights.

Shareholder representatives appointed to the Supervisory Board

The scheduled election of the shareholder representatives on the Supervisory Board was also on the agenda of the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting. The separate election procedure for the employee representatives had already been completed in March 2023. The shareholders elected Jürgen Abromeit (proposed for chairmanship), Dr. Dorothee Becker, Jan Klingelnberg, Barbara Schick and Prof. Dr. Isabell M. Welpe as their repre­sentatives – each for a term of office until the end of the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting that decides on the formal approval of the acts for the financial year 2027. Carl Martin Welcker was re-elected as proposed as a member of the Supervisory Board for a term of office until the end of the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting that decides on the formal approval of the acts for the financial year 2025.

Further information on the Annual Shareholders’ Meeting, the speech by the Chairman of the Board of Management Dr. Johannes Schmidt and the voting results can be found here. An overview of the newly elected Supervisory Board can be found here.

Axel Meyer

COO Engineering
Axel Meyer (German citizen, born 1968) has been a member of the INDUS Board of Management since October 2017.

Until joining INDUS, he held various management positions at Schuler AG, most recently as Managing Director of Schuler Pressen and Head of the Service Division of the Schuler Group, Goeppingen, Germany.

Previously, Axel Meyer worked as a member of the Board of Management of the international management consultancy IMAGIN Prof. Bochmann AG, Eppstein im Taunus, Germany. He started his professional career in the Schuler Group's Solid Forming Division, initially in global sales and later as Division Manager.

Axel Meyer studied industrial engineering in Germany and the USA and earned a Master of Mergers & Acquisitions (LL.M.) at the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management while working. 

Gudrun Degenhart

COO Materials Solutions
Gudrun Degenhart (German citizen, born 1970) has been a member of the Board of Management of INDUS since October 2023.

She has more than 20 years of experience in the management and development of portfolio companies in Europe, USA and the Asia-Pacific regions.

Before joining INDUS, Gudrun Degenhart was CEO for the German portfolio companies of the international service group ISS. She previously worked for the thyssenkrupp Group, including as CEO of the international business unit for special lifts and as CEO of Materials Western Europe and Asia-Pacific. She gained experience in medium-sized companies as a board member of the construction technology company Schöck.

A graduate in business administration, she began her career by building up the Central and Eastern European activities of the construction specialist Lindner Group. 

Dr. Jörn Großmann

COO Infrastructure
Dr. Jörn Großmann (German citizen, born 1968) has been a member of the INDUS Board of Management since January 2019.

Up until joining INDUS, he worked for the Dutch group Aalberts Industries, with his last position being the sole managing director of Impreglon, Lüneburg, Germany.

He previously held various positions at the Georgsmarienhütte Group, initially becoming managing director of Mannstaedt, Troisdorf, Germany and later managing director of GMH Edelstahl Service Center Burg and GMH Engineering. Before Dr. Großmann became the managing director of Buderus Feinguss, Moers, Germany, he worked as a development engineer and as a technical director for Doncasters Precision Castings, Bochum, Germany.

He studied material sciences and earned a doctorate in the field of natural sciences.

Dr. -Ing. Johannes Schmidt

CEO
Dr. -Ing. Johannes Schmidt (German citizen, born 1961) has been a member of the Board of Management of INDUS since January 2006. He has assumed the position of CEO since July 2018.

Dr. -Ing. Schmidt was previously the sole managing director of ebm-papst Landshut, Germany, a manufacturer of ventilation motors and fans. During his tenure there, his main achievements included advancing the development of new product platforms and the internationalization of production sites.

Dr. -Ing. Schmidt began his career at Richard Bergner, a manufacturer of electrical instruments from Schwabach, Germany. He initially led product development before rising to the position of managing director during his 12 years at the company.

Schmidt, who studied mathematics, gained an engineering doctorate in mechanics from the Technical University of Darmstadt. 

Rudolf Weichert

CFO
Rudolf Weichert (German citizen, born 1963) is the CFO of INDUS.

Before joining the INDUS Board of Management in June 2012, he was a Partner at KPMG for nine years. He spent three of these years in Detroit, Michigan, United States, where he worked mainly with companies in the engineering, and materials trading industries.

Mr. Weichert, who holds a masters degree in business administration, worked for KPMG for about 20 years, primarily in the firm’s Duesseldorf office, where he worked mainly with multinational manufacturing corporations.