Good morning. Dear ladies and gentlemen, my name is Gerd Krieg. As the Chairman of the Supervisory Board, I would like to he was open the AGM of Fresenius as Iain Korkaji of Aktion Company Limited by shares, and I will be the Chairman of your committee. On behalf of the Board members and the Supervisory Board, I would kindly welcome you, our shareholders, shareholder representatives and representatives of the media who are following our AGM today via the Internet, a very cordial welcome. Our AGM this year does not take place neither at the usual date in May nor in the usual form with personal presence of our shareholders.
This is due to the special circumstances due to the COVID-nineteen pandemic. According to these circumstances, the Board members of Resenio's management SE and the general partner as well as the Supervisory Board of Resenio SA and Co KG Company Limited per shares have jointly decided to organize this year's AGM as a virtual event in order to protect our health. This is an opportunity that the German law has created as a reaction on the COVID-nineteen pandemic. Many of the stock listed companies have also made use of this new tool and have had a virtual AGM. The decision to opt for a virtual format was not easy for us because unfortunately, a virtual shareholders' meeting only offers restricted opportunities to talk to you, dear shareholders.
The virtual form allows us to protect your health and to communicate with you electronically and also take the required decisions required to be taken by this AGM. Dear ladies and gentlemen, after my preliminary remarks, I would now like to talk about the formal aspects and regulations of this virtual AGM, which are different from a normal AGM with a physical presence of shareholders. First of all, I would like to state and declare that the invitation to today's AGM was published in the Federal Gazette dated 07/15/2020 in correct form and on time. All required documents and information have been accessible on the Internet website of Fresenius SE and KhoKKAA, and they are still accessible during and also after this virtual shareholder meeting. One copy of each document can be found with Doctor.
Kersten von Schenck, our notary public, who will write the minutes of today's shareholder meetings as he did in the prior years. Doctor. Von Schenck, our notary public, is sitting next to me within a reasonable distance, of course. A very warm welcome to you, dear notary Doctor. Von Schenck.
The Board members of the General Partner Fresenius Management SAE. Today, the CEO, Mr. Stefan Sturm as well as the Board member with responsibility for finances, Mrs. Rachel MP, are here today, present on the podium. A very warm welcome to both of you.
The members of the Supervisory Board of Fresenius S. A. And KOR KJA are, apart from myself, both Vice Chairpersons of the Supervisory Board. Mrs. Grit Genster and Mr.
Michel Dieckmann are present today. I warmly welcome the representatives of the Board and the Supervisory Board. A very cordial welcome to all of you. All other members of the Board of Management SE and the Supervisory Board of Fresenius SE and Co KGA follow this AGM via the Internet with sound and visual transmission. This is due to the current situation with COVID-nineteen and is supposed to reduce the number of social personal contacts during this AGM.
So we are reducing social contacts as far as we can. A very warm welcome also to Mr. Roedermer and Mr. Wetzel from the KPMGAG Wirtschafts Bruffungsgesellschaft auditing company, who were the auditors for the business year 2019 and who are here today in their function as our auditors for the business year 2019. Ladies and gentlemen, of course, for a virtual shareholders meeting, we also have a list of attendants as is legally required.
The voting representatives of the company are represented with the shares that they do represent. In this context, I would like to mention and declare that the share capital has not changed since the invitation to the AGM. It still is EUR 5 and 57,467,084. That is our share capital represented here. According to the list of attendants, we have the current attendance for this virtual AGM today, following a list of attendants.
I do have the updated list of attendance of the equity capital of the company amounting to EUR 5 and €57,467,084 We have 557,004 and 48 shares and 406,733,457 shares represented by the equal number of votes are represented here. This amounts to 70.96% of our share capital. Going beyond this, we also have written votes cast for 282,821 shares they were received. Thus, we have a total of EUR $4.00 7,000,000 or 16,278 shares amounting to EUR 70 3.1% of the share capital represented here. The list of attendants also is open for inspection in this conference room where the meeting takes place and will be updated on a regular basis, if necessary.
Shareholders who registered in correct form and time and on time were able to submit questions up to the end of 08/25/2020. So you could submit questions via the shareholder portal in the Internet. These questions will be answered after the presentation by Mr. Strom and after my presentation on activities of the Supervisory Board in the past business year. It is important to state right now that we did not select the questions that will be answered.
We will answer all the questions that were submitted. We will answer these questions as exhaustively as we would do if this were a classical AGM with shareholders present. Repeating questions will be summarized wherever it is reasonable. Furthermore, all shareholders who registered for the attendance on due time and in due form were able to exercise the voting rights before the AGM either with an electronical ballot, postal ballot or giving instructions and proxy votes to the represent voting representatives of the company. During our virtual AGM, it is still possible if you are logged in via the shareholders portal in the Internet, you can still vote, cast a vote or give instructions.
You can do so until the end of the general debate before we start to vote. So you may still exercise your voting right electronically. I will tell you and instruct you when the last possibility to cast your vote or give instructions electronically will take place and when it will expire. But dear ladies and gentlemen, if you still would like to cast your vote, please do so right now in order to vote on time and to exclude any delays because of the Internet connection. I would also like to state and declare that there are no countermotions submitted to the company that we should report.
So these are so far for all the formal aspects. Dear ladies and gentlemen, now we would like to start dealing with the agenda of this AGM, Item one on our agenda today. Item one is the presentation of the annual financial statements and the consolidated financial statements, each approved by the Supervisory Board and the management reports for Fresenius SE KORKGE and the group and report of the Supervisory Board for the fiscal year 2019 as well as the resolution on the approval of the annual financial statements of Fresenius S. A. And Kokage of Acting for the fiscal year 2019.
As I have already mentioned, the documents, the aforementioned documents are open for inspection via the Internet shareholder portal of our company. Of course, you have the opportunity to check these documents during our virtual AGM and going beyond this AGM. These documents are open for inspection or open for a download if you want to. You can also find the report of the general partner concerning the statements according to Section two eighty six paragraph one of the German Stock Corporation Act and three fifteen A Section paragraph one of the German Commercial Code. All of this is open for inspection.
So I may assume that all documents aforementioned are accessible and well known. Our notary public, Doctor. Von Schenck, holds one physical copy here during the AGM. Now I would kindly ask Mr. Sturm to tell us more about item number one on our agenda and talk about the forecast for the current business year.
Mr. Sturm, the floor is yours.
Dear shareholders, a very warm welcome to the Annual General Meeting of Fresenius, which is being held this year under very special circumstances, not in May, not in Frankfurt as usual and not with you in the same room. I doubt that any of us could have imagined this just one year ago. I know I couldn't have. It's clear, we have repeatedly discussed having a bigger online component. But a purely virtual AGM, that would have been a very bold decision.
And this was a decision that we did not make lightly. But one thing is very clear for us. Protecting your health, ladies and gentlemen, has top priority. Nevertheless, I am going to miss speaking directly to you and will miss your reactions, for example, to my speech. I cannot see your faces.
I'm just speaking into two cameras. This is a very unusual feeling. But I also want to see the positive side. Certainly, more shareholders will be taking part because making a special tip to Frankfurt fills an entire day or they don't have the possibility to do so. Many today, all you need is an Internet connection.
I think that we will gain a lot of valuable experience today. And so together, let us make the best out of this virtual AGM. It is not only the circumstances of this AGM that shows us how the coronavirus has the world firmly in its grip. Now as before, as the CEO of Fresenius, I am frequently asked, do we need to prepare for a second wave? And if so, when?
And my answer is, I don't even know if we have the first wave behind us. The coronavirus is here, and it's not going to go away all that soon. This pandemic is an unprecedented challenge. Also for Fresenos and particularly for Fresenos because we are a health care company. We are part of the solution, and we are needed more than ever before.
We are making our contribution to ensure that health care systems can continue to function around the world even in a crisis like this. We are doing everything possible to provide the best possible care for people. This is our responsibility, and we will do justice to this responsibility. I am proud of this. And especially, I'm very proud of our fantastic employees.
We now have more than 300,000 employees, and they deserve the credit for all that we have achieved during this pandemic. Their service has been unparalleled and often on the very front line in our hospitals, in our dialysis clinics, in our plants and in logistics. They have kept the machine running at times under difficult conditions, but they were always there, and they are still there for our patients. If we were all gathered in the same hall today, I would ask you to give them a big round of applause. But surely I wouldn't have even had to ask you to give them a round of applause.
Allow me to give you a couple of examples of what I mean. Our acute care hospitals, of which there are about 130, have naturally been and remain a focal point. We made them fully available for the treatment of COVID-nineteen patients. That is true of Helios in Germany and it is true of Quironsalud in Spain and Latin America. We have significantly increased the number of intensive care beds and respirator stations everywhere and extremely quickly, too.
Especially the situation in Spain was dramatic for a period of time. In an initiative that I found particularly moving, teams of doctors and nurses from Germany traveled to Spain to support their Spanish colleagues. The call for volunteers had hardly gone out before our inbox was overflowing with offers to go. Every volunteer understood the risk but saw the need to help as well as an opportunity to gather practical experience in dealing with COVID-nineteen. Coronavirus also presents an enormous challenge in dialysis.
As you all know, dialysis patients cannot just simply stay home. They depend on their treatments, in most cases three times a week, or else they die. We operate more than 4,000 dialysis clinics around the world, and we have significantly stepped up our safety and hygiene measures. In this way, we protect our colleagues and ensure that our renal disease patients can continue to receive their life saving dialysis. But what happens when dialysis patients are infected with COVID-nineteen?
They still need dialysis. And this is the reason why we launched a very special project of cooperation in The United States. With other dialysis providers, we reconfigured selected dialysis centers so that patients could be isolated for treatment. This protects other patients and lifts some of the burden from hospitals, which otherwise would have had to treat these people infected with the virus as well. This is absolutely vital, and that also applies to many of our products.
And it's also the reason why we've done everything we can to maintain production and distribution. Where possible, we have even increased capacity. And this is true for both Fresenius Medical Care and Fresenius Kabi. At Fresenius Medical Care, it was particularly the products for acute dialysis that have been in high demand because COVID-nineteen often leads to acute kidney failure. We have also significantly expanded the production of NovoLung devices, which can be used to treat patients with lung failure, another possible consequence of COVID-nineteen.
The demand for some of the drugs produced by Fresenius Kabi have also increased significantly as a result of the pandemic. Here, too, we have reacted quickly to adjust production in order to devote all suitable capacities to the drugs that are in particularly high demand. However, we did not take advantage of the situation. Despite significantly higher demand, we have kept prices stable and communicated that clearly. For me, this was simply the right thing to do.
These are only a few of the many examples of our contribution towards the battle against the coronavirus, a battle that is affecting all of us as a society, but also us as a company. We have learned an awful lot since February. We've made changes. We have adjusted. All of this within a very short period of time.
Many of these changes will remain even after the battle has been won. Let's take the home office as an example or more precisely mobile work. As many of our employees are nurses and physicians or they work in production or in logistics. For them, home office is not an option. However, in administrative functions, we are very consistently switched to mobile work for the safety of our employees and everyone else as well.
Home office is something we have also used pre coronavirus, but not that extensively and not as consistently, not like now. That has been a very major adjustment. But I have to say, it works. Act very well, even, also for me personally. But will we all be working exclusively from home in the future?
I don't think so. A number of things would be lost over the course of time: trust, culture, values. My assumption is that we will see hybrid models. We won't be in the office quite as often, but as a result, when we are there, we will use the time even more intensively. The coronavirus has not only accelerated the digitalization processes in office life, but across the board, especially in our medical offerings.
Take telemedicine, for example. The pandemic has opened many eyes to its potential. Potential. Much of what is being done today on an inpatient basis will be done on an outpatient basis in the future. And many things that are done on an outpatient basis now will be done at home.
We see a very clear confirmation of our approach, and we are working at full speed to expand our offering in this area. There's another thing that the coronavirus has brought us, namely a stronger community, more of the feeling of we at Fresenius. As you all know, we are a huge company with a decentralized structure with very good reason, but we have the same values and the same goal, providing ever better medicine for ever more people. The crisis had made that very clear to us once again. And thus, it has not only allowed us to grow together, but we have also come together.
The extent of the support between the business segments across countries and continents has never been this high. Everyone is doing their best. They're sharing their knowledge, benefiting from others' experience, and they are learning a lot from each other. And I am confident that we will continue to hold on to this after the pandemic. Those are the positive aspects.
But of course, this pandemic remains a huge challenge medically and economically. We have had to make a much greater effort. And in some areas, we have faced and continue to face considerable restrictions, especially in our hospitals as well as in our post acute care clinics or in the projects business of Fresenius Vamed. And for Fresenius Kabi, fewer surgeries means less demand for drugs. This has all had an impact on our balance sheet.
Yes, our sales accretes again in the 2020 by 5%. On the other hand, our earnings fell by minus 6%, albeit from a very high level. Our estimate is that without the coronavirus, the earnings would have increased by three approximately in line with sales. We are not used to declines in earnings, and we don't even want to get used to this. But if you look around and in view of the overall situation, we have come through the crisis quite solidly so far.
Unfortunately, the same does not apply to our share price. In 2019, it rose another 18%, but from a very low base. But this past March, the extent of the pandemic became increasingly clear and the fears of a worldwide economic crisis grew, sending the world stock markets on a downward spiral that our share was unable to escape. At one point, it was only worth €25 We are now well above that level. But in recent weeks, the share has again lost ground.
There are apparently still doubts about how well Fresenius will come through this crisis. We, on the other hand, are optimistic, and we are working very hard to overcome these doubts to win back trust in our future development, your trust. Because I am convinced Fresenio stands on a broad and solid foundation with resilience that has proved its worth now more than ever before. Our expectation is that in the coming quarters, earnings will again increase. What will that mean for our short and medium term forecast?
Allow me to come back to that later. Because first, I would like to get a little bit political. I know you're not used to that for me, but these are exceptional times. Germany has come through the pandemic very well so far, without a doubt. Yet there have been mistakes.
And although the challenges were unprecedented, these mistakes could have been avoided. Of course, we are all smarter with hindsight. Yet it is important to draw the right lessons so that we can at least avoid repeating the same mistakes. The first mistake was focusing everything unilaterally and totally to the pandemic. I think this was true in many areas of society, especially in medicine.
Sure, COVID-nineteen is clearly a huge threat. I've already pointed this out during the course of my speech. But there are other illnesses as well, strokes, heart attacks, cancers, just to name a few. They did not simply disappear when the coronavirus came. Yet because of the virus, far fewer patients were treated after the lockdown because they were afraid to go to the hospital And because we were told to shut everything down, far fewer tests were conducted, which meant many illnesses were not detected or detected too late and thus were unable to be treated.
The resulting harm is not as easily quantifiable as the number of corona victims, but they are there. We shut everything down. Although the major corona wave never came to Germany, I believe that was wrong because the hospitals, especially ours, have shown that they can very quickly adapt and adjust, create capacity. We do not have to keep hundreds of intensive care beds in reserve unused. We don't have to postpone other important procedures.
We need flexible structures and closer networking between hospitals. Then we can react quickly and effectively even to a crisis like this. This is not only more efficient, it also takes an account of everybody. And that brings me to another point. In the crisis, many countries have tended to be selfish.
You can call it caution or protecting your own people, but it is still selfishness. And this selfishness hurts everyone in the end. One example, the German prohibition on exporting protective equipment. Bad enough that Germany was only thinking about itself here, but it wasn't thought through. For example, in our Kabi facility in Graz in Austria, we produce propofol, an important sedative, especially during the pandemic because it is used to sedate mechanically ventilated patients.
This plant in Graz supplies all of Europe, and production employees are strictly required to wear protective equipment. This equipment comes from Germany, and suddenly, we were prevented from sending it to Austria. No protective clothing and therefore, no propofol for all of Europe. At the last minute, we were able to persuade officials to lift the ban. This example shows that the national solutions do not help, especially in a crisis.
It's much more about solidarity and working together. It's about capturing the advantages of a global division of labor. This is the principle we work by at Fresenius. We draw on the skills and resources of many different countries for the benefit of our patients. And that is what I would wish from our political decision makers and not a relapse into national isolation.
Dear shareholders, that was quite a lot about the coronavirus, but the pandemic is in a very special situation. And that's why I felt that this subject merited that much attention because I think you want to know more about this and also want to know how your company is doing. How are we coping with the challenges and how we will be meeting our responsibility? I hope I was able to answer some of your questions. Of course, we are also here today to talk about 2019.
After all, this is the Annual General Meeting for the last fiscal year. And I am pleased to say it was a good year for us, a successful year once again. And that's why I also want to give this subject the attention it deserves. First of all, 2019 was a year of investment, as we said it would be. We had always invested a great deal, and these investments had been increased once again, investments in research and development, in the continued development of our business.
The goal, to place Fresenius on an even better footing for the common dictate to remain successful in the long run. This means that in the short term, we are willing to accept somewhat lower financial returns. Investments cost money. What happens when we invest more than we usually do? It weighs in our profit, at least temporarily.
But this is the means by which we ensure our continued growth, our future success, a success that we measure primarily in medical terms, even more patients, even better treatments, even more forward thinking health care. These successes also pay off in economic terms, and they will continue to make us an attractive investment in the future. 2019 was more than just a year of investment. It was also a year of continued growth. We achieved a new set of all time highs, applies both to revenues and to earnings, namely for the sixteenth consecutive year.
Earnings were EUR 1,900,000,000.0, which despite our increased investments still represented a zero five percent increase. Revenues rose 6% to EUR 35,500,000,000.0. All of these figures are in constant currency. Based on these results, we not only were able to meet our forecast, they also allowed us to recommend raising the dividend once again. And this represents the 20 successive increase, provided, of course, that you give us your approval.
Our proposal, a dividend of €0.84 This represents a 5% rise, a substantial increase. Even our higher investments and the coronavirus do not change this. We have a long term orientation, and we want to remain successful in the long run. And that is the basis of our proposal to share the success with you. So much for the numbers.
The work we did on the ground in 2019 to achieve these results is something I would like to present to you now in the form of a few examples. Let's start with Fresenius Medical Care. We closed the acquisition of NxStage, a very important step that allowed us to substantially raise our presence in home dialysis. This form of treatment is becoming more and more prevalent, most of all in The United States. However, this trend can also be found in other parts of the world.
That was the case even before the coronavirus. Now demand has grown even stronger. We are making great strides in integrating NxStage, and we are investing heavily in the infrastructure that is needed. And we are doing this because we want to provide home dialysis on a large scale. Moreover, we have launched the 4,008 A in more markets, including China.
This is the new dialysis machine developed especially for use in developing countries. It allows us to substantially improve access to life saving dialysis there. And we have something else to celebrate, the fortieth anniversary of our most important production facility for dialysis machine in the city of Schweinfurt in Germany's Franconia region. One of every two dialysis machines used worldwide comes from Schweinfurt. In addition, we have expanded our international network of dialysis centers, 66 new centers in only one year.
Fresenius Kabi also had a milestone to celebrate. In 2019, we launched our first biosimilar. It is called Idacio and inhibits inflammation. Among its uses is the treatment of rheumatism. In conjunction with this, we opened our research and development center for biosimilars in Eisen in Switzerland.
Biosimilars is a new field of treatment for us. We have great expectations for biosimilars. So far, there are many reasons to believe that we will be able to meet these expectations. In addition, there have been major investments in our factories, for example, in the Chinese city of Wuxi, for example, where we manufacture clinical nutrition products. But especially strongly in The United States, even without the tailwinds of last year.
A major competitor appears to have solved its internal problems and regained market share. And that is the reason that our revenues in the country dropped slightly in 2019. Although we posted excellent growth in other parts of the world, for example, in the emerging markets, but this was not quite enough to offset the developments in The United States. We are working hard to improve our position there. Investments will help us in this respect.
At the same time, we again see very good opportunities for expansion in other markets, and we will take full advantage of these opportunities. I would now like to turn to Fresenius Helios. Developments there were mixed once again. Let us begin with a look at Germany. We are continuing to perceive the impact of the consequences of regulatory changes.
The trend towards more ambulatory care is another contributing factor. At the same time, the measures we have taken to respond are beginning to show results. We have successfully implemented new business models. One example is occupational medicine. We've also increased our range of services in preventive care.
We have opened up Helios prevention centers in several large cities, including Berlin and Munich. What we offer is one stop medical checkups, easy to reach and without lengthy waiting times, and should the need arise with direct access to the Helios Care network. Moreover, we have also pushed forward the digitalization of our hospitals. One of the major money projects here is a digital portal for our patients with more comfort and a wide variety of functions. These include access to laboratory results and the ability to make appointments.
And perhaps you will recall, we plan to hire 1,000 additional nurses. This goal was substantially exceeded. We are pleased to welcome 1,300 new and dedicated colleagues. And this year, we are again going to grow through acquisitions. Four Malteser hospitals, that is a humanitarian aid group, are located in the Western German cities of Bonn, Duisburg and Krefeld, will become part of Helios.
Together, they offer about 1,300 belts and have more than 2,700 employees. We are planning to close these acquisitions before the end of the year. Let's now turn to Spain. Quironsalud has again posted strong growth. As expected, we acquired another hospital in Albacete, which is an outstanding addition to our existing network in Southeast Spain.
In Madrid, we completed work on the country's first center for proton beam therapy, right on time and target. Proton beam therapy is a specialized form of cancer treatment, ultramodern, much less invasive. We've already treated more than 40 patients, and about 30 of them have already successfully completed their treatment. Moreover, we have also increased our presence in Colombia with several acquisitions. In total, Quironsalud now operates five hospitals there in the cities of Cali and Medellin.
And soon, we will be present in the capital city of Bogota. We agreed to an acquisition there in February. And we also acquired CETIMED, the country's leading provider of medical diagnostic services. Developments at Fresenius Vamed in 2019 also were very good. As you know, we transferred the Helios rehabilitation facilities to Vamed in 2018.
Last year, we successfully concluded the integration activities. Vamed is now one of the leading rehab providers for post acute care. There was also a milestone in project development, the opening of the new central clinics in Kiel in Lubeck, which are part of the Schleswig Holstein University Hospital, and the modernization program is almost completed. This project was more than just remodeling and new construction at the two sites. Technical operations management until 2044 is also part of the contract.
The total project volume is €1,700,000,000 To sum up, 2019 was another successful year for Fresenius. We continued to grow, and we took important steps for the future growth. 2019 also showed us that continued growth will require more effort. The competition has gotten stiffer. There is more price pressure.
Regulation in some sectors is increasing. This means we must do more to be and to stay successful. As already outlined, we have to invest more. We did a lot in this respect last year, and we also achieved a lot. We will adhere to this course in the future.
At the same time, we must and will keep a close watch on our costs. That is not new, but it has become even more important now. This is the only way to retain the financial latitude needed for investments, investments in our future. This future continues to look bright. As I said at the beginning, we are needed now more than ever, especially in times like these.
Even before the onset of the coronavirus, the need for high quality medicine was increasing around the world. We offer high quality medicine. We want to serve this demand, and we can do so. And that is why we will continue to be successful. What does that mean for our outlook?
Despite all of the uncertainties, we want to give you specific numbers, not just general expectations. We want you to know where you stand with us. However, this is a difficult task even under normal circumstances, and the coronavirus has made it even more difficult. The basis for our forecast is no major second wave in our relevant markets, only local or regional outbreaks. They can be expected to continue, and then they can be met with local measures, but not another global lockdown.
We believe this is realistic. Of course, there is no guarantee. In many places, infections are increasing once again. And this is a situation we will need to monitor very closely. But on this basis, we believe that the second quarter reached the bottom for us economically.
The rest of the year will also see our earnings rebound. Our expectations for the full year in constant currency, of course, revenues, plus 3% to plus 6% earnings, minus 4% to plus 1%. This is less than what we expected before the coronavirus, of course, But it is not little. It means that our company is continuing to grow. It means that we are continuing to build our business, that we are treating even more patients.
I believe this would be a strong result, a result that proves our ability to withstand adversity. And I am very confident that we will reach these goals. You're probably wondering, what about our medium term goals? You will recall, revenues were supposed to increase on average between 47% annually through 2023. In terms of earnings, it was supposed to be 5% to 9%.
We will grow somewhat more slowly than planned this year due to the coronavirus. This will have to be compensated for in the coming years. Nevertheless, I believe that we are on the right path, and there's no reason to diverge from this goal. Will acquisitions help us? Probably.
But their effect is not contained in these numbers. The figures are based solely on our growth under own power, that is organic growth. However, we regularly make small and medium sized acquisitions. If these were to be factored in, then that would give us an additional 1%. Dear shareholders, I believe I have thoroughly reported to you on the coronavirus situation and about our development in the past fiscal year, about our visions for the future.
And I would gladly have tackled another topic today, a topic that means a great deal to many people. That topic is sustainability, an extremely important subject. It's a subject with many facets and one that is closely aligned with Fresenius. We have not talked about it much in the past, perhaps not enough. And this is something I want to change.
But today is not the day to do so. The coronavirus has turned the world upside down. How should we deal with this? What does this mean for us? I thought it was important to report to you on this subject and explain to you what we are doing as fully as possible.
Of course, I would have liked to report to you just as fully on the topic of sustainability, but I promise you, we will make up for this as soon as possible. Internally, we are devoting much time to this topic very intensively. We have created a sustainability panel on the corporate level. It reports directly to me. And this is where we will be formulating specific sustainability goals.
And we will also be making adjustments to the compensation system for the management board. In the future, nonfinancial aspects will also be included. We are going to anchor sustainability even more firmly in Fresenius, even more deeply than it already is. This brings me to the end of my speech, which has been given to you under very special circumstances. I hope you have gained a very thorough overview.
Where do we stand? Where are we going in uncertain times like these? As I said at the beginning, the coronavirus represents a challenge of unknown proportions, and this also applies to our companies. However, we are very well positioned to deal with this. We will do justice to our responsibilities, and we will continue to grow.
The highest guiding principle in everything that we do, and this will also be the case in the future, continues to be the well-being of our patients. We are committed to our patients for their health and for their lives. And this is something we will always keep our eyes on because not only will our patients then benefit, but Fresenius will also remain successful in the long run. Please stay healthy. My heartfelt thanks for your attention.
Thank you, Mr. Strom, for your detailed explanations. The Supervisory Board wishes you
The Supervisory Board wish you and your colleagues, the management board, every success and good luck in designing the long term development of Fresenius. Mr. Storm has made it very clear that we are undergoing very special times as a health care company. And in this pandemic, we bear a special responsibility. It is very impressive how the company, the management board and its employees are doing justice to this responsibility.
Dear shareholders, I am confident that I'm acting on your behalf as well when I express my thanks to the management board of Management SE and all of the employees who are working for Fresenius around the world for their very challenging and successful work in fiscal year twenty nineteen and particularly in these very difficult times characterized by this pandemic. Our special thanks also go to those employees who, through their very high personal dedication and their willingness to accept risks to treat all of the patients who've become ill through COVID-nineteen and who are in need of care as in a very close situation, both in the hospital and at home. At this point, I would like to inform you about some changes since the last, annual general meeting. Hi, good. Hi, Doctor.
Kurtz.
June 30.
Management Board of Fresenius Management SE as of the 06/30/2020 at his own request. I really regret this greatly. I thank him at this point once again, in particular, for his very successful work in the past fifteen years, of which thirteen were as a member of the Management Board. On behalf of the Supervisory Board, I wish him professionally and privately all the best and lots of success for the future. His successor as the Management Board Member responsible for Law Compliance and Personnel as well as the Labor Director will be Doctor.
Sebastian Bietenkov by no later than the 01/01/2021. We are pleased that with Doctor. Bietenkov, we have been able to acquire an extremely qualified and experienced personality for Fresenius.
Those shareholders and guests who are following our AGM outside of the password protected shareholder portal would like to say goodbye to those who do not listen via the shareholder portal.