#Spinning

2015-03-27

Daniel Lippuner hands over the helm of Saurer Group to Martin Folini in May

Daniel Lippuner and Dr. Martin Folini at the Saurer Board Meeting end of March 2015.(c) 2015 Saurer

After being first the designated and later the actual CEO of the Saurer Group for 2 years, Daniel Lippuner is handing over his post to Martin Folini for personal reasons. Based on an agreement between the Board of Directors and Daniel Lippuner, Martin Folini takes over as the CEO of the Group and Daniel Lippuner stays on board until the end of April to support a smooth transition.

Having played a key role in the carve out from Oerlikon and in the forming of the new Saurer as the Group CEO over the past 2 years, he has laid a solid basis for the future development of the company. “I have been with Oerlikon/Saurer for 9 years”, Daniel Lippuner says, “I have very much enjoyed working with the new Saurer, the employees are great and I am confident that I leave Saurer in good hands.

Martin Folini has so much knowledge about the industry and technology; it makes him the right person to drive the growth strategy and the innovation pipelines.” Martin Folini, current CEO of the Group’s largest Business Unit (Schlafhorst Zinser) will have a double role in the organization in the future, taking on the challenge of being Group CEO in parallel to his current function as BU CEO.

Pan Xueping, Chairman of the Board of Saurer and Owner of the Jinsheng Group says “We sincerely appreciate the passion and commitment Daniel Lippuner has shown during the last years, resulting in an excellent top and bottom line performance of the Saurer Group.

Daniel Lippuner had agreed to support Martin Folini in the start phase ensuring that all the projects that he has so successfully been driving will continue enabling Saurer Group achieving its vision. We wish Daniel Lippuner all the best for his future endeavors.”

At the same time, we are proud to have Martin Folini, a long term textile professional, succeed Daniel Lippuner at the helm of the Saurer Group. The new Saurer CEO Dr. Martin Folini has in-depth knowledge of the textile industry from his more than 15 years, something he shares with all the Saurer employees: at Saurer “we live textile”.

He graduated from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) Zurich in 1990 with a PhD. He then worked for Rieter for more than 15 years, of which 7 years as the CEO of Spun Yarn Systems (equivalent of BU Schlafhorst Zinser in Saurer) and 6 years as Head Manufacturing & Procurement. Since 2010, he was the CEO of Pfiffner Group, a leading supplier of efficient, high precision, automatic industrial machines.

On November 1^st 2014 he joined the Saurer Group as he was appointed CEO of the Business Unit Schlafhorst Zinser. Since then Martin Folini has driven organizational changes in the Business Unit in re-arranging the product lines to Focus on customer needs and bringing forth groundbreaking innovations in a faster pace.

The new organization will allow him to divide his time between the Business Unit and the Group management. Based on Saurer’s Vision, Mission and Core Values, Dr. Folini will further develop and drive Saurer’s growth strategy.