Brose Acquires Bosch Lock Systems

COBURG, Germany and STUTTGART, Germany, Aug. 15 -- Effective November 1, 2002, the Brose Group will take over the lock system activities of Robert Bosch GmbH, Stuttgart. Beyond that, Bosch and Brose will work together in the area of lock systems with vehicle access rights. Both companies, in the scope of a letter of intent, agreed. The acquisition stands under the reservation of approval of German government authorities.

The lock system activities of Bosch encompass the business with locks and all mechanical operating components including the electronic lock function for automobiles. Bosch is represented with this business in the German location Wuppertal; additionally, more locations are in Tschechien (Roznov), Portugal (Tondela), Korea (Buyong), USA (Albion and Farmington Hills) and Mexico (San Luis Potosi). In total, Bosch has approximately 1,700 employees for the lock system division, and will probably reach, in 2002, a turnover of approximately 220 million Euros.

With the entry into the lock systems business, Brose expands its competence in the vehicle door and will be the second largest German company offering lock systems. The Brose Group is, with business volume of 1.5 billion Euros and 5,000 employees at 20 locations, the worldwide leader for window regulator and door systems that combine all mechanical, electrical, and electronic functions of the vehicle door.

In total, with more than 200 production sites over all continents, The Bosch Group's three business sectors, Automotive Technology, Industrial Technology, and Consumer Goods and Building Technology, generated a turnover of 34 billion Euros in the past year. Alone in the business sector of Automotive Technology -- Bosch is the worldwide second largest maker -- in 2001 approximately 143,400 employees gained a turnover of 23.2 billion Euros.