67th Annual General Meeting of the AVR

iPad in hand, AVR President Adnan Tanglay took to the stage to offer guests an opening 3D simulation of the Roche site at Grenzacherstrasse in Basel: the year is 2023 and viewers are whisked past an array of modern structures forming a coherent ensemble of Buildings 4, 5, 6 and – as the centrepiece – Building 7 with the pRED Innovation Centre. At that point, Adnan Tanglay handed over to Dr Geo Adam, Global Head of pRED Facilities & Infrastructure Projects, who took the audience on an exclusive virtual tour of the planned pRED Innovation Centre.

Following the impressive visualisation of Roche as a “great place to work in the future”, Adnan Tanglay switched back to the present and moved on to the items of business on the agenda. First of all, he thanked the AVR Committee for the trust placed in him, now in his fourth year as AVR President. He said that a positive and proactive culture of exchange and communication was the key ingredient for a successful working relationship. In this context, he thanked all functions, HR management and, in particular, the senior management for their kind support and exemplary partnership.

The look back at the past financial year 2016 once again illustrated the breadth of activities in which the AVR is involved alongside day-to-day business operations. The items on the agenda in 2016 included not only the retirees’ event and the site representative elections; there were also a total of four reorganisations to successfully oversee. Adnan Tanglay explained that one of the objectives for 2017 was to conduct continuing professional development for the Committee at the annual offsite meeting. This is scheduled to comprise a training session from the Leadership Excellence programme and the second part of the training on “Cultural differences”. This year, the AVR is again making itself available to sponsor two bachelor’s theses at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts Northwestern Switzerland (FHNW).

In addition to the ordinary elections of the Auditing Committee and Advisory Board members, there were also some extraordinary elections on the agenda this time. Ursula Bingler, AVR Vice President since 2013, stepped down from her position. She received an official word of thanks and celebratory farewell. Gernot Scharf, a member of the Executive Committee since 2008, was unanimously elected as the new Vice President. His vacant seat on the Executive Committee goes to Ruedi Vorburger, who has actively supported the AVR Committee for 15 years. Dr Michael Pantze, who has worked on behalf of the AVR since 1999, will retire in the course of this year and step down as an associate member of the Executive Committee at the end of October. He also deserves a huge thank-you. Dr Michael Pantze was made an honorary member in recognition of his many years of service to the AVR.
Turning to the Advisory Board members, Lisa Giezendanner stepped down and Alice Unglaub was elected to take her place. All other Advisory Board and Auditing Committee members were confirmed for another two years.
The AVR President once again thanked all those stepping down and congratulated the newly elected and re-elected office bearers.

Once the items of business on the agenda had been transacted, the AVR for the first time welcomed a guest from the Roche family: Mr André Hoffmann, a representative of the family pool and Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors of Roche Holding AG, gave a talk on “Sustainability management at Roche”. Mr Hoffmann is a fourth-generation member of the Roche family and has sat on the Board of Directors of Roche since 1996. In his presentation, he touched on the importance of family, health and the sustainability of success. Citing as an example the family-run MAVA Foundation for the conservation of biodiversity, he advocated a sustainable model of business and its extension to as many companies as possible. In doing so, he stressed the idea of partnerships – the MAVA Foundation provides funding for 850 projects to 280 partners. Mr Hoffmann made it clear that, without corporate profits, there could be no sustainability and humankind’s current problems would remain unsolved. The Roche business model is therefore designed to be both profitable and responsible, he said, with sustainability management following a holistic approach that takes into account all levels of the company. Its success in several respects shows that Roche is on the right track with its model. For example, Roche was last year voted Industry Leader in the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices for the eighth time in succession and, despite rising sales, was able to improve its environmental footprint – which, he explained, was ultimately reflected in its investments.
The guests followed Mr André Hoffmann’s inspiring presentation with great interest and afterwards had an opportunity to converse with him directly over aperitifs.

This time, the reception at the close of the event was generous in every respect. Both in the Avenue staff restaurant on the third floor and in the Terazza cafeteria on the fourth floor, the team from Tavero AG served guests a selection of the finest drinks and snacks.
AVR President Adnan Tanglay was very pleased to see the AVR members in attendance, but at the same time very much regretted the fact that not more had accepted the AVR’s invitation.

The minutes of the General Meeting are stored electronically on the AVR homepage. It is planned to send the invitation to the next General Meeting to active members electronically and to retirees by post as usual.

The next General Meeting will take place on 22 March 2018 in the auditorium of Building 1.