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September 3, 2003
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Ladies
and Gentlemen,
Every once in a while, major shifts occur which dramatically
change what is required of an organization. For us, this became
true the last 15 months. The launch of Bayer CropScience marked
the opening chapter of the book we are writing page by page. We
set out to merge two global ventures thereby creating a new
leader with a single identity and a corporate culture that
combines the strengths of both companies.
And I am proud to say that within a very short period of time,
we have built an excellent base and solid platform from which to
achieve our ambitious goals.
Over the last year, we have made profound progress integrating
our global processes. Merging the businesses on the country
level was one of the most crucial and challenging tasks of
integration, as the huge administrative effort associated with
the integration process had to be managed in parallel to the
utmost business priority of defending our market share.
In addition, we have successfully completed the divestments
imposed by the European and Federal Trade commissions within the
stringent time schedule demanded. 33 individual projects
comprising the overall divestiture package achieved a total
value of Euro 1.7 billion, representing a sales multiple of 2.4.
I would like to point out that the entire process was managed
under extreme time pressure and - with the exception of the
fipronil package and Everest® herbicide - without
outside support.
It is well worth noting that we have mastered the difficult
restructuring phase without losing the necessary scope of the
partners that matter most - our customers around the world.
Which brings me to one of the core strengths of the new company
- its people - the key success factor behind the exceptional
performance we have delivered in the difficult transition
period. I have no doubt that our new team represents the cream
of the crop of both companies and possesses the talent, focus,
insight and experience to achieve the goals we have set
ourselves in the years to come.
Bayer
CropScience AG became a fully operative legal entity on October
1, 2002 as the first sub-group of Bayer AG.
Its structure reflects our intent to be a customer and
business-driven company.
Our country representations are the cornerstone of our business.
Reporting into the regional organization, they are empowered to
make necessary business decisions close to the customer.
At the same time, our operative functions carry global
responsibilities which enable us to implement our global
strategies most efficiently while sharing valuable expertise and
ideas throughout this network.
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