Executive Changes at Aventis Make CropScience Sale Likely

Executive Changes at Aventis Make CropScience Sale Likely

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C.--Horst Waesche, a member of the board of management of Aventis and chairman of the supervisory board of Aventis CropScience Holding, has been vested by the supervisory board to immediately assume the position of executive chairman of Aventis CropScience, as Alain Godard has resigned from the position. The change in executive leadership of the CropScience division has made an outright sale of CropScience the most likely option for divesting the division.

Since November 2000, Aventis has been reviewing options for divesting its CropScience division before the end of the year, a decision that came after an evaluation of corporate strategy for housing a pharmaceutical and crop science division within the same company, which began in May 2000. "Then we announced the results of our review of that strategy in November of last year, saying we decided to divest CropScience by the end of this year, 2001," said John Abrams, U.S. spokesperson for Aventis. Options that were considered included an initial public offering (IPO), a possible merger and an outright sale of the division. Abrams noted that while a trade-sale is the most likely route Aventis will take in regard to the CropScience division, the company is still keeping all options open.

In researching the sale of CropScience, Aventis has already approached "possible purchasers of the CropScience business," Abrams said, though he could not divulge those companies' names. "The requirement that we have is that the business would have to be purchased en toto as opposed to breaking it up into pieces."

One more consideration to be made in the divulgence of CropScience is what Germany's Schering AG has to say. The German company owns 24 percent of AventisCropScience, dating back to the merger of Rhone-Poulenc and Hoechst in December 1999 that formedAventis. "Schering AG is obviously a very important shareholder and they have a very important voice in what happens with the CropScience business," Abrams said. A decision is expected before 2002. To read more aboutAventis, visit www.aventis.com.