Stefan Oschmann has been elected as the new Chairman of the Executive Board and CEO of Merck, based in Darmstadt, Germany.
The appointment will take effect after the Annual General Meeting on 29 April next year. Oschmann will succeed Karl-Ludwig Kley who will retire after nine years as head of Merck.
Oschmann has been a member of the Executive Board of Merck since 2011. He was initially in charge of the pharma business before being appointed as Deputy Chairman of the Executive Board and Deputy CEO at the beginning of this year, responsible for strategy and innovation.
'Under the leadership of Karl-Ludwig Kley, Merck years has gone through the biggest transformation in its almost 350-year history. This entailed building and expanding no fewer than three strong global businesses that are able to provide ground-breaking solutions for patients and customers and secure growth and affluence for our 40,000 employees,' said Johannes Baillou, Chairman of the Board of Partners of E. Merck.
'We want to express our deep gratitude and respect for his achievements. We’re equally happy to have found a successor in Stefan Oschmann early on, whose strategic foresight and strong leadership have turned Merck into a respected player in the pharma industry again.
'We’re convinced that he will take the right steps to position Merck in a way that will allow the company to continue to actively shape an environment that has been experiencing fundamental scientific and digital changes.'
Prior to joining Merck, Oschmann worked for more than 20 years for US pharma company MSD Merck Sharp & Dohme. He is President of the IFPMA (International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers & Associations) and Vice President of EFPIA (European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries and Associations).
Kley has been a member of the Supervisory Board of Merck and the Board of Partners of E. Merck since 2004. In 2006 he became Deputy Chairman of the Executive Board of Merck before taking over as Chairman in 2007.
Prior to that, he was Chief Financial Officer at Deutsche Lufthansa for eight years and joined the airline’s supervisory board in 2013.
Kley is Deputy Chairman of the supervisory board of BMW and a member of the supervisory board of Bertelsmann. In addition, he is Vice President of the German Chemicals Association (VCI) and a member of the steering committee of the Federation of German Industries (BDI).