Supervisory board extends contract with Christian Kullmann

• Evonik affirms its strategic focus
• Measures implemented in recent years are paying off
• Sustainability is a growth driver

Essen. Christian Kullmann, who has been chairman of Evonik's executive board since May 2017, will head this Essen-based specialty chemicals company for another five years. At its meeting today, the supervisory board extended Kullmann's contract until May 2027.

“Christian Kullmann has shown excellent leadership during his present term of office as chairman of the executive board. He has played a key role in driving forward the company, and successfully kept it on track in challenging times. The supervisory board has therefore decided that it is important and right to enable Christian Kullmann to continue what he has started. We have great confidence in his ability to transform Evonik into a best-in-class specialty chemicals company and look forward to continuing to work with him,” says Bernd Tönjes, chairman of the supervisory board of Evonik. Extending Kullmann's contract enables the company to drive forward and strengthen its strategy: concentrating on specialty chemicals, pooling innovative capability, focusing on sustainability, and profitable growth.

Kullmann is grateful to the supervisory board for its confidence in him and has announced further steps to increase growth and profitability. Sustainability will play an extremely important role in this. “Profitable and sustainable growth is the toughest discipline in industry,” says Kullmann. “We want to rank right at the top, and that is what our customers want, too. They are increasingly choosing our solutions in order to achieve their own sustainability targets.”

Kullmann compares the transformation into a best-in-class specialty chemicals company with a 100-meter sprint. “We have just reached the 50-meter mark,” he says. Along the way, Evonik's resilience to crises has been strengthened considerably, which has paid off in the coronavirus pandemic. Now the goal is to build on the progress made in establishing a performance-oriented culture and focusing on growth businesses with a good sustainability profile.

Kullmann therefore announced that further steps will be taken to optimize the portfolio in the coming years: “We will be investing specifically in our three growth divisions and focusing our combined innovative capability on developing new products."

Kullmann (52) was appointed to Evonik’s executive board as chief strategic officer in 2014 and became chairman of the executive board in May 2017. Since March 2020, he has also headed the German chemical industry association, VCI. Kullmann is married and has two daughters.