Bayer completes NewCo management team

By Patrick Raleigh, ERJ On-line news editor

Leverkusen, Germany-Bayer AG has appointed Matthias Zachert as chief financial officer designate of NewCo, a business entity which is to include Bayer's rubber and rubber chemicals businesses. Zachert, who is currently group chief financial officer of Kamps AG, will take up his position on 1 June.

Zachert's career includes playing a key role in the integration of pharmaceutical companies Hoechst Marion Roussel and Rhône-Poulenc Rorer, which subsequently became Aventis Pharma. His appointment completes the management team of NewCo, which is due to be listed on the stock market by early 2005, by early 2005, Bayer said.

NewCo, which is soon to renamed, is headed by Axel Claus Heitmann, a former general manager of Bayer's Rubber Business Group. The firm consists of four segments: Performance Rubber, Performance Chemicals, Chemical Intermediates and Performance Plastics, with combined sales of Euro5600 million and 20 000 employees.

Performance Rubber, which will supply rubber polymers for the tyre and rubber goods markets, will generate annual sales of Euro1400 million. The firm's portfolio includes butadiene rubber (BR), butyl rubber, EPDM, styrene butadiene rubber, polychloroprene and nitrile rubber.

The unit will also include the GE Bayer Silicones joint venture, but not Bayer's Euro300-million turnover rubber chemicals unit, which is to join NewCo Performance Chemicals, Bayer has previously stated.

NewCo will include Rhein Chemie Rheinau GmbH, though Bayer has yet to decide how it will fit within the company. The speciality chemicals supplier reported a 2002 turnover of Euro326 million, mostly from sales to the rubber industry