Ekosem-Agrar changes legal form to increase financing flexibility
The intent of the change is to increase the company’s flexibility for future growth financing. In this context, the management has initiated, among other financing options, the preparation of an initial public offering. The decision on the choice and timing of financing alternatives depends on financial markets and industry developments, the respective conditions and strategic considerations.
Board composition
With the change in legal form the respective executive and supervisory board of the newly formed Ekosem-Agrar AG have been constituted. The supervisory board consists of the four following members:
Franz-Georg von Busse, chief representative of agricultural machinery group Gebrüder Pöttinger GmbH and former executive member in various international economic associations including the German Eastern Business Association;
Wolfgang Graf, former CFO and member of the board of the Ehrmann Dairy Group;
Vladislav Novoselov, founder and managing partner of the Russian consulting firm BEFL, focused on advisory services in the farming sector; and,
Rolf Zürn, owner and managing director of Zürn GmbH & Co. KG, a distributer of John Deere machinery and Zürn Harvesting GmbH & Co. KG, a manufacturing company of agricultural machinery as well as a major shareholder of Ekosem-Agrar.
New structure
For the management board the following members have been appointed:
Stefan Dürr (CEO), founder and major shareholder of Ekosem-Agrar Group; and,
Wolfgang Bläsi (CFO), who has already acted as CFO of Ekosem-Agrar Group from 2011 to 2016.
In the first half of FY 2018, the group continued to expand its market leading position in raw milk production in Russia by increasing its dairy cow herd by 15% to 51,750 and its daily milk output by more than 25% to 1,365 tonnes.
In addition, the company continues to optimize its own milk processing facilities and to set up sales and marketing activities to further increase its value added in the production of dairy products.
The corporate group has close to 9,000 employees in seven regions in Russia and achieved a total output of €246m ($288m) and an adjusted EBITDA of €69.5m ($81.3m) in 2017.
