Jurgen Kiehne to Manage MBtech North America

DETROIT, April 21 -- During today's press conference at the SAE Congress in Detroit, MI, USA, the MBtech Group presented the new man at the head of its North American subsidiary: As of May 1, 2009 Jurgen Kiehne (54) will take over as the President of MB-technology NA LLC, assuming the responsibility for the further expansion of the company's engineering and consulting services on the important US market.

"We are happy to have won an expert from the automobile industry who possesses comprehensive technical competence and many years of management experience. Under his management MBtech will substantially intensify its activities on the North American market -- the 10th anniversary of our US branch in Troy, Michigan, represents the perfect starting point," explained Hartmut Tresp, President of the MBtech Group, during the press conference at the exhibition stand at Detroit's Cobo Center.

After studying electrical engineering, Mr. Kiehne began his career in 1980 as a graduate engineer at Daimler AG. The passionate golf and tennis player held a diverse range of project and management positions in Electrical/Electronics and passenger vehicle development for Mercedes-Benz and smart. In addition, he also introduced a number of programs to increase efficiency and quality. As the global Head of Development Electrical/Electronics & Diagnosis at EvoBus he was responsible for all of the Mercedes-Benz, SETRA and Orion commercial vehicle series.

"In view of the North American automobile industry's currently difficult situation we will do everything to build on and expand MBtech NA's range of services over the long term. It is important to establish the MBtech Group's core competencies -- e.g. in the fields of hybrid, HiL testing and powertrain variant application -- in the USA as well. Instead of primarily supporting our customers with experts, as we have done up until now, in the future we will emphasize establishing competence centers and project-related work. This will enable us to position ourselves sustainably on the North American market as the engineering and consulting service provider for the mobility industry," stated Kiehne.

About the MBtech Group

The MBtech Group is a globally active, internationally leading automotive engineering and consulting company in Europe, North America and Asia.

MBtech offers comprehensive, integrated expertise along the product creation process and the product life cycle. The brand MBtech covers all products and services in four segments: MBtech vehicle engineering, MBtech powertrain solutions, MBtech electronics solutions and MBtech consulting. MBtech develops, integrates and tests components, systems, modules and vehicles. We focus on customer-oriented services consisting of a combination of engineering, consulting, operations and qualification. Flexible, inter-disciplinary project teams work in close collaboration with our customers, suppliers and cooperation partners.

In 2008 the MBtech Group achieved a worldwide turnover of US$530 million with approximately 2,700 employees.