The chairman of Wieland-Werke in Ulm, Harald Kroener, is the new president of the WirtschaftsVereinigung Metalle (WVM). Kroener was elected unanimously by the board at a meeting in Berlin. Kroener follows Oliver Bell, who had stepped down from his office at the end of March. The reason behind was a professional change to a company outside of the non-ferrous metal industry.
Kroener announced that the field of energy policy will play a decisive role also for him in his new capacity. “From politicians we expect planning dependability and no additional liabilities which penalize us on the international stage. This is the only way we can invest again more in the Germany location in future,” said the the new WVM president. Another important subject Kroener named was the digital networking of the industry. The materials of the non-ferrous metal industry are fundamental for the success of Industry 4.0.
The WVM board elected Rupprecht Kemper (Managing Director of Gebr. Kemper GmbH + Co. KG) as new vice president. Heinz-Peter Schlüter (Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Trimet SE) will also remain as vice president. The new treasurer of WVM is Roland Leder (Vice President Finance of Aleris Rolled Products Germany GmbH).
The new WVM president Harald Kroener (63) has been spokesman or respectively chairman of the board of Wieland-Werke AG in Ulm since 1999, and member of the executive committee of WVM since 2005. From 2010 to 2014 Kroener was president of the umbrella association for the German non-ferrous metal industry (Gesamtverband der Deutschen Buntmetallindustrie).