OMV appoints Thomas Gangl new Borealis CEO
The Supervisory Board of Borealis has appointed Thomas Gangl, 49, to the post of chief executive officer of Borealis AG. He will take over the role from Alfred Stern, effective April 1, 2021. Alfred Stern will join the OMV Executive Board and will be responsible for the Chemicals & Materials division of the Austrian global energy and chemicals company.
Borealis, a subsidiary of OMV, is one of the world’s leading providers of advanced and circular polyolefin solutions and a European market leader in base chemicals, fertilizers and the mechanical recycling of plastics. Borealis operates in more than 120 countries.
Gangl is currently a member of the OMV Executive Board and is responsible for OMV’s Refining & Petrochemical Operations. Gangl graduated from the University of Salford (Manchester) with a degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1997 and the Vienna University of Technology with a degree in Chemical and Process Engineering in 1998. He joined OMV in 1998 as process engineer at the Schwechat Refinery, where he rose through the ranks. In 2014, he was appointed Schwechat Refinery Manager, a post he held until 2016. In 2016, he was appointed senior vice president, Business Unit Refining & Petrochemicals, where he was responsible for all three OMV refineries. In 2019, he was appointed OMV Executive Board member and chief downstream operations officer.
“By appointing Thomas Gangl we have succeeded in gaining an exceptional manager and expert from among our own ranks to take the helm of Borealis. In recent years, Thomas Gangl has not only played a significant part in shaping the refining and petrochemicals business in the OMV Group but was also responsible for establishing chemical recycling and thereby laying the foundation for our future circular economy,” said Rainer Seele, chairman of the Supervisory Board of Borealis AG and CEO of OMV.
The Supervisory Board of OMV Aktiengesellschaft recently approved a reorganization of the OMV Group, involving splitting and expanding the current area of Refining & Petrochemical Operations into two areas: Refining and Chemicals & Materials. With this change, all responsibilities for the petrochemicals and chemicals sector are bundled in one division, supporting OMV’s forward integration in the chemicals sector.
The decision on the Executive Board member for Refining will be taken at a later stage, OMV said.
