Group Management Report Products Safety and Health Environment Human Resources Social Commitment Consolidated Financial Statements 75
ment, or if there was a trend reversal concerning the use of
silver and gray colors in the consumer sector.
Innovation
We have to continually streamline our product and service
portfolio to be able to continue to pursue our strategy for
profitable growth in the long term. Should ALTANA manage
to enhance its innovativeness more quickly than expected
or to increase its share of new products for which there is a
high demand beyond the target level, there would be even
better prospects for growth. The same applies if we entered
new markets or opened up new application fields for our
products.
Company Acquisitions and Portfolio Measures
Acquisitions play a key role in ALTANA’s long-term value creation.
In recent years, we have continually advanced the
Group strategically due to acquisitions. At the same time, we
cleansed our portfolio of those activities that were not in
line with our strategic aims and for which there were no long-
term value-creation perspectives within the Group.
In the future, we intend to continue to boost our growth
by acquiring companies and activities. This is an essential
prerequisite for us to achieve our strategic growth targets.
Should opportunities arise in the future that exceed our
expectations, these new activities could help us strengthen
our market positions and open up new market segments.
This, in turn, could help us achieve our strategic targets more
quickly.
Synergies
The ALTANA Group is decentralized to a large extent. Still, in
some areas of the value-creation chain and in certain
management functions, central units support the divisions
and play a coordinating role. To the extent that we man-
age to push forward the networks within the Group more
Opportunities
The identification and evaluation of opportunities for our
future business development is integrated into the different
planning, analysis, and control processes.
Within the framework of strategic planning, we analyze
demand trends as well as market and technology devel-
opments with regard to options for action that could enable
ALTANA to create value. In addition, the divisions contin-
ually examine possibilities of developing new sales markets.
During the financial-planning process, the effects of action
options are evaluated and discussed so that we can optimally
exploit future opportunities. Finally, possible opportunities
for short-term business development, along with the atten-
dant risks, are dealt with in detail at all levels of manage-
ment.
Below, major opportunities are described that could lead
to ALTANA’s surpassing its short-, medium-, or long-term
goals. The order corresponds to our assessment of the effects
on our business performance.
Economic and Industry Development
Should the economic environment in the established indus-
trial regions important for ALTANA, and particularly in the
U.S. and Europe, develop better than we anticipated, unex-
pected growth impetus could arise. As a result, demand
for our products and services could develop more positively
and exceed our forecast. The same applies to growth in
the important emerging countries in Asia and South America.
If the growth rates in these nations were higher than ex-
pected, we might be able to benefit from this to a disproportionately
high extent due to our market positions.
In addition to regional factors, growth impetus can also
result from individual branches of industry. Further poten-
tial could be opened up, in particular, if the automotive sector
and the construction industry showed a positive develop-