Half of supervisory board members newly appointed

At the 8th annual general meeting of Praktiker AG in Hamburg last Wednesday there were elections for all eight members of the supervisory board on the shareholder side. Six members of this board, including the previous chairman Dr Eberhard F. Grossnigg, were confirmed in office. New to the board are Hans Schmitz, an entrepreneur from Bornheim, and Gerhard Sandler, an independent management consultant from Hinterbrühl near Vienna. Neither Dr Harald Wiedmann nor Alexander Eichner stood for re-election. At the AGM the executive board was provided with authorisation to increase capital within the next five years by as much as € 57 mio if and when required and under certain conditions. The meeting also approved a four-year share option programme for the board members and managerial staff of Praktiker AG to a total value of nine million euros. A motion to move the headquarters of Praktiker AG to Hamburg, where group headquarters has been located since the middle of 2012, was withdrawn by the chairman before the meeting began.