The new Paper Business Areas will be located at the centers of their markets. UPM Paper Asia will be headquartered in Shanghai, China, and UPM Paper Europe in Augsburg, Germany. The Group Head Office will remain in Helsinki, Finland.

“Changes in management structure will sharpen the targets and required actions for each business. We will address the competitive challenge in mature European businesses and drive profitable growth outside Europe and in biorefining. The new management structure will also increase transparency of the company performance,” says Jussi Pesonen, President and CEO of UPM. “We are determined to change UPM. We will also seek to simplify our business portfolio and uncover the value of our assets. These opportunities will be explored in parallel with the profitability improvement and growth initiatives and may involve changes in ownership structures.”

“Although the Paper Business Group has been able to improve efficiency and managed change and integration processes professionally, we now need to move into a more simple and scalable structure to improve performance further,” continues Pesonen.

UPM has identified actions with an overall profit improvement impact of EUR 200 million in its existing businesses. Each business will implement a profit improvement program with simplified business model and variable and fixed cost savings. These planned actions do not include additional capacity closures at this time.

To ensure prompt implementation of profitability improvement and growth plans UPM’s Board of Directors has confirmed the following appointments in the UPM Group Executive Team: Heikki Vappula, currently President for UPM’s Energy and Pulp Business Group, has been appointed Executive Vice President, UPM Biorefining. Tapio Korpeinen has been appointed Executive Vice President, UPM Energy. Tapio will also continue in his current role as the Chief Financial Officer, including responsibilities for Finance & Control, Treasury, Investor Relations, IT, Sourcing and Real Estate. Tapio Kolunsarka, currently Senior Vice President, UPM Raflatac, Emea has been appointed Executive Vice President, UPM Raflatac as of 1 September 2013. Tapio is a new member in the Group Executive Team. Kim Poulsen, currently Executive Vice President, Paper Business Asia Pacific and Corporate Relations, has been appointed Executive Vice President, UPM Paper Asia. Bernd Eikens, currently Senior Vice President, Supply Chain, UPM Paper Business Group, has been appointed Executive Vice President, UPM Paper Europe. Mika Sillanpää has been appointed Executive Vice President, UPM Plywood. Mika is a new member in the Group Executive Team. Kari Ståhlberg, currently Senior Vice President, Corporate Strategy, has been appointed Executive Vice President, Strategy. Kari is a new member in the Group Executive Team. Jyrki Ovaska currently President for UPM’s Paper Business Group, has been appointed Executive Vice President, Technology, responsible for R&D, Investment Management, wood plastic composite unit UPM Profi and New Business Development.

Hartmut Wurster Executive Vice President, Technology, will retire after 12 years in UPM and 31 years of service in the industry.