GUIDELINES FOR THE INDEPENDENCE
OF SUPERVISORY BOARD MEMBERS

A member of the Supervisory Board is deemed independent if he or she has no business or personal relationship with the Company or its management which could give rise to a material conflict of interests and influence how the member behaves.

In assessing the independence of a Supervisory Board member, the Supervisory Board follows the guidelines below: 

• The Supervisory Board member should not have been a member of the Management Board or a senior employee of the Company or a subsidiary of the company in the past five years.
• The Supervisory Board member should not have a business relationship with the company or a subsidiary of the Company in a scope of significance to the Supervisory Board member or should not have had same over the past year. This provision also applies to business relationships with companies in which the Supervisory Board member has a substantial economic interest. The approval of individual transactions conducted by the Supervisory Board in accordance with § 95 (5) Corporation Act (AktG) does not automatically result in the qualification of being independent.
• The Supervisory Board member should not have been auditor of the Company or stakeholder or employee of the auditing company in the past three years.
• The Supervisory Board member should not be a member of the Management Board in another company in which a member of the Management Board of the Company is a Supervisory Board member.
• The Supervisory Board member should not be a close family member (direct offspring, spouse, life-long partner, parent, uncle, aunt, sibling, niece, and nephew) of a member of the Management Board or of persons in one of the positions mentioned above.