Praise for the company’s strategy

“Your speech to us today was congenial, ambitious and on target,” commented Marc Tüngler from the German private investors’ association DSW following the Bayer Chairman’s address. He said it was on target because Dekkers had addressed the issues that matter to the stockholders and the speech also
reflected the spirit of optimism that prevails within the company – and it was congenial because Dekkers held it in German. “With you as Mr. Wenning’s successor, Bayer is again in good hands.” Hans-Martin Buhlmann from the German institutional shareholders’ association VIP agreed: “Your appointment was a minor revolution in terms of Bayer culture. After your speech, we sensed that the Supervisory Board made the right decision. As far as the stockholders are concerned, Dr. Marijn Dekkers has arrived.  Welcome!”

He said the goal must be to ensure transparency and predictability in the assessment of innovations. “We must assume that the global trend toward a cost / benefit analysis for innovative drug products will persist,” Dekkers explained. “We will therefore continue to carry out extensive studies to show that our products satisfy these requirements, thereby ensuring they will be suitably reimbursable.”

“However, we have also identified improvement potential that we are now systematically realizing,” he said. Cost structures are being optimized, and the money this frees up is being invested in the BioScience business, the commercialization of new products and the expansion of strategic growth  markets. “In this way we aim to make CropScience more efficient in all areas.”

Responding to a stockholder’s question, Dekkers made it clear that no changes are currently planned to the Bayer Group’s structure. “Our strategy is based on the three business areas of health care, crop protection and plastics,” Dekkers said. In such a large company as Bayer, it is important that each unit does good business and at least keeps pace with the competition, the Chairman explained. “Otherwise, there is a risk that too little will be invested in the weakest link, because returns are insufficient.  Fortunately, we currently do not see any need for action in this regard. Our three subgroups operate
profitably and competitively in attractive markets.” In this connection, the Bayer CEO explained that the company primarily aims to grow organically, yet regularly examines acquisition opportunities as well. He said that acquisitions are conceivable at HealthCare and CropScience in particular.

The advancement of women at Bayer was a major topic of the discussion, with the debate about statutory quotas for management positions one of the main themes. “We don’t believe that rigid rules are the right way to go about this,” said Dekkers. Performance, motivation and commitment are the deciding factors. “Nevertheless, we are aware that we still do not have enough women in management positions.” The company therefore resolved at the beginning of the year to increase the proportion of women in  management positions throughout the Group toward 30 percent by 2015. According to Dekkers, the number of highly qualified women at Bayer is now so large that more female applicants are bound to be promoted to fill vacant managerial positions in the future – “even without the help of a statutory quota.” 

One stockholder questioned the company’s efforts to reduce the emission of the climate gas carbon dioxide. “There is no basis for criticism here,” Dekkers replied, explaining that Bayer has succeeded in separating economic growth from greenhouse gas emissions. Although emissions increased by 4.9 percent in 2010, he said, Bayer at the same time registered a gratifying increase of nearly 20 percent in production volume. The significant reduction in emissions in relative terms resulted from improvements in process technology and from higher capacity utilization, Dekkers explained. Bayer’s achievements in this area are also recognized by independent organizations. For example, the company is currently included in various leading sustainability indices, such as the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index and the Dow Jones Sustainability Europe Index. Furthermore, Bayer in 2010 was once again included in the
Carbon Disclosure Leadership Index as the best company in its sector.

Other discussion topics included some that had featured at previous Annual Stockholders’ Meetings – such as the safety of the YAZ™ family of oral contraceptives, the dispute regarding the former Schering product Duogynon / Primodos, bee deaths, LL RICE and the CFO Werner Baumann gave detailed and comprehensive responses to all questions. In the subsequent voting, the stockholders approved the proposals of the Supervisory Board and the Board of Management (see inset below) by broad majorities.