Reorganization of the Carl Zeiss Board of Management

The reallocation of responsibilities in the Board of Management is being accompanied by an organizational realignment of the Carl Zeiss Group. With this structure, the Group is consistently sharpening its focus on further growth. In mid-2001 the Board of Management created the ”Evolution” project to define and implement the targets involved. The restructuring is the company’s response both to the changed conditions now confronting it in international competition and to the increase in its overall size. President and CEO Dr. Dieter Kurz explains this as follows: ”In the past few years the growth in sales at Carl Zeiss has averaged 10% a year. We intend to ensure that we remain on course to further growth by tailoring the new structure to these changed dimensions.”

In future, the business groups will themselves be responsible for business-related functions relevant to their success such as financial controlling, human resource management and operational purchasing, allowing them to utilize growth opportunities more flexibly and with greater autonomy. This includes the possibility of cooperating with and acquiring other companies in order to open up new fields of business. Internally, the reorganization will improve the cooperation between the business groups and the service/central divisions.

To achieve this goal, two Service Centers will be set up in Oberkochen and Jena and allocated to Member of the Board Dr. Norbert Gorny. In this strategy, Dr. Gorny sees a major opportunity for the future: ”This focusing of services in two Service Centers will enable us to provide a uniform standard of quality throughout the entire Group, allowing internal customers to purchase top-class services from corporate units specially geared to their requirements.”

In addition to the Service Centers, there will also be Central Divisions which, due to their strategic importance, will be directly overseen by the Board of Management and each centrally managed within the Carl Zeiss Group. These areas include Research, Information Technology, Finance and Accounting, Legal Affairs and Patents, and Central Procurement. In addition, a new, ”slim” Corporate Center will be created which will be based in Oberkochen and support the Board of Management in the performance of its strategic duties.

The measures of the ”Evolution” project will be implemented by the beginning of the new fiscal year on October 1, 2002. The Works Council has approved the realignment in principle.