Frank Koch new CEO of Swiss Steel Group as of July 1, 2021
Frank Koch will become Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Swiss Steel Group, a global leader in special long steel, on July 1, 2021. The Board of Directors has appointed Frank Koch as CEO in December 2020 effective no later than January 1, 2022 (as published in the media release as per December 21, 2020) and has now reached an agreement with his previous employer for an earlier start date. The current CEO Clemens Iller will leave the company on June 30, 2021.
Frank Koch (49) successfully led and restructured the long-established German steel producer GMH Group (Georgsmarienhütte) as CEO in 2017 until the end of December 2020. Since 2008, he has been responsible for various functions within the Group. He began his career as CSO and Head of Logistics for the largest company in the GMH Group, the steel mill in Georgsmarienhütte. In 2015, he became COO of the entire GMH Group and thus joined the Executive Board as Managing Director. Frank Koch began his career in 1991 with an apprenticeship in industrial general administration in the steel division of ThyssenKrupp. He then held various management positions in the ThyssenKrupp Group, including at Deutsche Edelstahlwerke, now part of the Swiss Steel Group, before taking on responsibility for strategy and sales at leading Italian steel producer Danieli from 2003 to 2005. In 2005 he returned to Deutsche Edelstahlwerke, where he was responsible for sales and strategy until the beginning of 2008.
Heinrich Christen, Chairman of the Board of Directors, stated: "Frank Koch has everything it takes to lead Swiss Steel Group to success as CEO, even in times of continuing major challenges. With an impressive career from basic training to CEO of a complex industrial group and positions at several leading steel companies, Frank Koch has outstanding strategic and operational skills and experience. He has success-fully implemented comprehensive turnaround and restructuring programs and in each case achieved sig-nificant improvements in the operating and financial performance of the companies he led."