Change at the helm of ThyssenKrupp’s North American Operations: Torsten Gessner stepped down as CEO of ThyssenKrupp North America, Inc. as of October 10, 2014 to pursue other opportunities. Patrick Bass, currently senior vice president Product Lifecycle Management/R&D at the ThyssenKrupp Elevator headquarter in Germany will become CEO of ThyssenKrupp North America, Inc. as of January 1, 2015. Kevin Backus, Senior Vice President and General Counsel at ThyssenKrupp North America, Inc., will be responsible for the Regional Headquarter on an interim basis. With a turnover of bn 8.3 € in fiscal year 2012/2013 and 20,000 employees North America is the biggest and most important foreign market of the Essen based industrial and engineering group.

Patrick Bass started his career at ThyssenKrupp with ThyssenKrupp Elevator Corp., Horn Lake/USA as a Mechanical Engineer in 1999. He served in various positions in the Elevator organization where he took over the position of Executive Vice President of R&D before he changed to ThyssenKrupp’s Elevator headquarter in Essen/Germany and took over the position of Senior Vice President Product/R&D in 2012. “Patrick Bass is an excellent business executive who has proven to successfully manage complex challenges. We wish Patrick Bass a very good start and success in further strengthening our businesses and regional structure in North America”, says Dr Donatus Kaufmann, member of ThyssenKrupp Executive Board.

Torsten Gessner started his career as Chief Operating Officer at ThyssenKrupp CENE in 2005. In 2009 he became CEO of ThyssenKrupp’s global Business Unit for Escalators and Passenger Boarding Bridges, headquartered in Germany. In 2012 Torsten Gessner moved to the USA to assume responsibility as CEO for the implementation of ThyssenKrupp’s first regional organization in North America (USA, Canada, Mexico) headquartered in Chicago. Dr. Donatus Kaufmann: “We thank Torsten Gessner for his significant efforts building up our regional business structure. In close collaboration with our operating units he made important progress in positioning ThyssenKrupp better in the North American market. We wish him all the best in his future professional and personal life.”

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