EANS-News: Rheinmetall AG / Rheinmetall and MAN Nutzfahrzeuge form joint company for wheeled military vehicles

With the founding of Rheinmetall MAN Military Vehicles GmbH, the
market for logistical and tactical military vehicles has an important
new provider of complete solutions.

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Joint Ventures/Cooperation/Collaboration/Military Vehicles

Subtitle: With the founding of Rheinmetall MAN Military Vehicles
GmbH, the market for logistical and tactical military vehicles has an
important new provider of complete solutions.

Düsseldorf (euro adhoc) - Rheinmetall AG and MAN Nutzfahrzeuge AG are
to form a joint company for military wheeled vehicles. A contract to
this end has now been signed by the two companies. The new company,
which will be known as Rheinmetall MAN Military Vehicles GmbH (RMMV),
is an important provider of complete solutions in the market for
military wheeled vehicles, covering the entire range of armoured and
unarmoured transport, command and role-specific vehicles for the
international armed forces. Rheinmetall will have a stake of 51
percent and MAN 49 percent in the new company, which will be
headquartered in Munich. The plan is still subject to approval from
the competition authorities.

"With this new company we are combining the strong MAN and
Rheinmetall brands and the complementary technological core
competencies of the two partners to form a globally operating system
provider, which will present one face to the military customer with
the goal of improving its position in the world market," said
Dr.-Ing. Georg Pachta-Reyhofen, Chairman of the Executive Board of
MAN Nutzfahrzeuge AG at the signing of the contract. RMMV unites
MAN's automotive expertise in commercial vehicle manufacture with
Rheinmetall's technological know-how in the military field.

"The new company follows the trend towards the joint acquisition of
logistical and tactical military vehicles, whose protective and
mobility characteristics have become highly similar because of
current operational conditions," explained Klaus Eberhardt, Chairman
of the Executive Board of Rheinmetall AG. "With their joint
enterprise MAN and Rheinmetall are at the same time making an
important contribution to the necessary consolidation of military
vehicle systems at national and European levels," Eberhardt
continued.

The first step calls for the merging of the development and sales
activities of the two companies in the military wheeled vehicle
sector under the aegis of the new company, which thus takes over
product and market responsibility. The second contractually agreed
step sees the two companies' production capacities at the plants in
Kassel (Rheinmetall) and Vienna (MAN Nutzfahrzeuge) integrated into
the joint company by the end of 2011.

In the initial phase, RMMV will have around 370 employees; when the
second step has been completed this will increase to around 1,300
employees, whose annual turnover will amount to more than a billion
euros.

About Rheinmetall: Rheinmetall is an international technology group
serving the global defence and automotive sectors. Last year its
20,000 employees generated some EUR3.4 billion in sales, including
EUR1.9 billion in the defence sector. This makes Rheinmetall one of
the world´s leading suppliers of systems and equipment for land
forces. In the wheeled armoured vehicle segment the company offers an
extensive array of systems, ranging in weight from five to over 30
tons. Its best-known vehicles include the Fuchs/Fox of which 1,250
units are deployed by the German Armed Forces and the armed forces of
a further eight nations. In 2008, Rheinmetall Defence took over Stork
PWV in the Netherlands and is responsible for supplying a total of
285 units in the framework of the German-Dutch program for building
the Boxer armoured transport vehicle.

Responsibility for developing and manufacturing tracked armoured
vehicles and turret systems remains with Rheinmetall Landsysteme
GmbH, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Rheinmetall AG. In 2009,
Rheinmetall has had outstanding successes in winning major contracts
for the new Puma infantry fighting vehicle and the new mortar combat
system for the Federal Armed Forces as well as orders from abroad,
totalling around 1.5 billion euros.

About MAN Nutzfahrzeuge: MAN Nutzfahrzeuge Gruppe, headquartered in
Munich, Germany, is the largest company of the MAN Group and a
leading international supplier of efficient commercial vehicles and
innovative transport solutions. In fiscal 2008 the enterprise, with
over 36,000 employees, posted sales of more than 96,000 trucks and
over 7,200 buses and bus chassis of the MAN and NEOPLAN brands worth
10.6 billion euros.

MAN Nutzfahrzeuge Österreich AG, headquartered in Steyr, is the
Austrian subsidiary of the MAN Nutzfahrzeuge Gruppe and comprises the
Business Unit Light/Medium Trucks (production of commercial vehicles
in this series in Steyr) and the Business Unit Military Division
(development, production and sales of military trucks, based in
Vienna). MAN has approximately 4,000 employees at its plants in Steyr
and Vienna plants. Sales worth 1.89 billion euros were posted in
2008.

end of announcement euro adhoc
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ots Originaltext: Rheinmetall AG
Im Internet recherchierbar: http://www.presseportal.de

Further inquiry note:

Peter Ruecker, Head of Corporate Communications

Phone: +49-211 473-4320

Oliver Hoffmann, Head of Public Relations

Phone: +49-211 473-4748

Branche: Holding companies
ISIN: DE0007030009
WKN: 703000
Index: MDAX
Börsen: Frankfurt / regulated dealing/prime standard
Hannover / free trade
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