Neustadt an der Weinstrasse, September 11, 2013. The directors from British retail group Kingfisher plc, London, have resigned from the Supervisory Board of HORNBACH HOLDING AG. Kevin Oâ??Byrne (Kingfisher Divisional CEO, B&Q) and David Paramor (Finance and Planning Director, Kingfisher plc) will thus retire from the supervisory body as of September 11, 2013. Kingfisherâ??s representative on the Supervisory Board of the HORNBACH-Baumarkt-AG subsidiary, John Declerck (Group Strategy Director, Kingfisher plc), will also retire from his position at the same time.


The reason given was that this precautionary measure would avoid any potential conflicts of interest resulting from these directorsâ?? involvement in their companiesâ?? respective expansion strategies. Since its takeover of 15 Bricostore DIY stores in Romania in May 2013, Kingfisher has been in direct competition with its German cooperation partner for the first time since the strategic alliance with HORNBACH began in December 2001. As announced by Kingfisher upon the publication of its interim results on September 11, 2013, the British company is planning its own market launch in Germany in summer 2014, in this case with four trial "Screwfix" stores, a small-scale specialist retail format aimed at professional customers.

Kingfisher holds a qualified minority shareholding of 25% plus two shares in the voting capital of HORNBACH HOLDING AG. Moreover, Kingfisher owns 17.4% of the publicly listed preference shares in HORNBACH HOLDING AG (ISIN DE0006083439) and 5.2% of the publicly listed ordinary shares in HORNBACH-Baumarkt-AG (ISIN DE0006084403).

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