New CFO for the Oerlikon Group

Oerlikon appoints Markus Richter, currently Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of its Surface Solutions division, as the new Group CFO and a member of the Executive Committee, effective 1 October 2024. He will succeed Philipp Mueller. Until the planned separation of the Polymer Processing Solutions division is finalized, Richter will continue to hold both the Group CFO and Surface Solutions division CFO roles.

Markus Richter joined Oerlikon around two years ago as CFO for the Surface Solutions division and a member of the division’s leadership team. Prior to this, he was a partner at KPMG in Zurich for 10 years, where he led the Financial Management Advisory services. Before KPMG, Richter held various leadership roles in finance at Daimler AG in Stuttgart and Madrid. He began his career at Arthur Andersen in Stuttgart and Tokyo. Markus Richter holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Business Administration from the ESB Business School, Reutlingen and London.

“The appointment of Markus Richter and combining the roles of Group and Surface Solutions Chief Financial Officer is fully in line with our pure play strategy and a lean, efficient company set up,” said Michael Suess, Executive Chairman of Oerlikon. “Markus Richter combines deep expertise in finance and transformation with a thorough understanding of our future core business. In the past two years, he was instrumental in positioning the organization and cost structure of Surface Solutions for accelerated profitable growth. With his international experience in finance and industry, particularly in transformation, Markus Richter is the right person to drive the performance of our future pure-play organization.”