Announcement of management changes in the 3U HOLDING Group

Joint press release of 3U HOLDING AG and weclapp SE:

  • Michael Schmidt will move from the Executive Board of weclapp SE to its Supervisory Board
  • Christoph Hellrung is appointed CFO of weclapp SE and resigns from his position as CFO of 3U HOLDING AG
  • Uwe Knoke is appointed CFO of 3U HOLDING AG

Marburg and Frankfurt/M., Germany, 29 October 2021 – The Supervisory Board of 3U HOLDING AG (ISIN DE0005167902) as well as the Supervisory Board of weclapp SE, a subsidiary of 3U HOLDING AG, intend, in agreement with the executives involved, and as part of the preparations for the possible IPO of weclapp SE, to make several personnel changes in the executive bodies of both companies. Accordingly, the following changes are planned:

Michael Schmidt, initially managing director of weclapp GmbH since its foundation, today CFO of the current weclapp SE, will resign from his office and will stand as a further member of the supervisory board at a general meeting yet to be convened. He will remain CEO of 3U HOLDING AG.

The new CFO of weclapp SE will be Christoph Hellrung. After almost 10 years as CFO of 3U HOLDING AG, Christoph Hellrung will resign from his position there and take over this task at weclapp SE. The new CFO of 3U HOLDING AG will be Uwe Knoke, previously CEO and CFO of 3U TELECOM GmbH and other telephony companies of the 3U Group for many years.

The agreement will be implemented as soon as possible by means of the respective required resolutions, appointments and management contracts. It has specifically to be seen in the context of a possible IPO of weclapp SE, which might occur in the first half of 2022, and is an important step to meet the increasingly high requirements of the capital market regarding the ESG standards (Environmental, Social and Governance) of stock exchange candidates, in particular with regard to corporate governance. It confirms the independence of the strategic and operative development of the stock market candidate weclapp SE within the 3U HOLDING group.

The Chairman of the Supervisory Board, Ralf Thoenes, emphasises: “We are always aware of our responsibility for the shareholders of 3U and for the existing and future shareholders of weclapp. We are realigning the management team in line with generally accepted governance standards and principles especially with a view to a possible IPO, which eventually might provide the means to further accelerate the profitable growth of weclapp SE and open up an interesting investment opportunity for investors.”

 

Contact at 3U HOLDING AG
Dr. Joachim Fleïng
Head of Investor Relations
Tel.: +49 6421 999-1200
Fax: +49 6421 999-1222
Email: ir@3u.net www.3u.net

About 3U:
3U HOLDING AG (www.3u.net) 3U HOLDING AG (www.3u.net) has its headquarters in Marburg, Germany, and was founded in 1997. It is the operating management and investment holding company at the head of the 3U Group. It acquires, operates and sells companies in the three segments of ITC (Information and Telecommunications Technology), Renewable Energies and SHAC (Sanitary, Heating and Air Conditioning Technology). The 3U Group has successful and profitable business models based on megatrends in all three segments. It continues to expand its business activities dynamically, particularly in its strongest growth areas of cloud computing and online trading, in which it is striving to achieve leading positions in the market. 3U HOLDING AG’s shares are traded on XETRA, Tradegate and on the German regional stock exchanges (ISIN: DE0005167902; identifier: UUU).

Contact at weclapp SE
Dr. Stephanie Nickel
Corporate Communications
Tel.: +49 69-33390-2211
Mobil: +49 177-5552955
Email: nickel@weclapp.com
www.weclapp.com | www.weclapp.se

About weclapp:
weclapp SE was founded in 2008 and has been offering the cloud-based platform of the same name since 2013. Since market entry, the company has grown by an average of almost 100% (CAGR) and is turning a profit. With Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), it mainly addresses small and medium-sized enterprises, with integrated ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and CRM (Customer Relationship Management) functionalities in particular. Customers thus have unrestricted access to their business transactions and data from any Internet-enabled device and from any location connected to the Internet. With storage and computing capacities in Germany and Switzerland and ISO 27001 certification, weclapp offers a high level of data security. The platform has repeatedly won awards as ERP system of the year. weclapp SE operates out of Frankfurt am Main and maintains branches in Marburg Kitzingen. Karlsruhe and Worms It is a subsidiary of Marburg-based 3U HOLDING AG. www.linkedin.com/company/weclapp.

weclapp SE: ITscope GmbH takeover completed

  • High potential for joint growth from cross-selling and upselling
  • Strategic synergies through scaling, internationalisation, and network expansion
  • Cloud-based ITscope-SaaS-to be continued

Marburg, 22 October 2021 – The Frankfurt Local Court has entered a capital increase against contribution in kind at weclapp SE, a subsidiary of 3U HOLDING AG (ISIN DE0005167902), in the commercial register. The new shares resulting from the capital increase were taken over by the shareholders of ITscope GmbH, who in return contributed all company shares in ITscope to weclapp SE. The takeover of ITscope by weclapp SE has thus been completed.

Ertan Özdil, CEO of weclapp SE, underlines: “Technologically, ITscope is a perfect fit for our cloud-based platform. The acquisition enriches the service offering for our customers; it accelerates our growth; but it is also an important strategic step to jointly expand our market coverage. Many ITscope customers already use weclapp as their ERP platform; weclapp customers book access to ITscope’s B2B platform. We have already started to expand the common basis and make it the basis for accelerated growth.”

weclapp SE has already been working together with ITscope GmbH for several years. The service offerings of both companies complement each other and will offer further potential benefits to mutual customers in the future. Both parties expect further cross- and upselling potentials from the merger, as well as additional possibilities to introduce the advantages of their range of services to customers in further industries and countries.

The Karlsruhe-based company operates a powerful, cloud-based B2B e-commerce platform as a SaaS solution that enables IT service providers such as system houses to digitalise their sales and purchasing and establish automated sales and purchasing processes for customers and suppliers. Direct customers of this offering currently include more than 3,000 companies. In addition, more than 400 distributors (IT wholesalers) and manufacturers are connected as data and product suppliers throughout Europe. This ITscope SaaS solution is already a popular add-on in the weclapp store and was named “Plugin of the Month” there in September 2021. In the future, the ITscope SaaS solution can be extended beyond the current industry focus for further industries.

In addition to this B2B platform, ITscope operates a solution that gives medium-sized companies in online trade additional competitive advantages. ITscope offers a customer product catalogue that provides master data for several million IT products for their users. The information comes from manufacturers and content providers who independently supply and update high-resolution images, detailed technical data and marketing texts, thus considerably simplifying the customer’s Product Information Management (PIM). For their part, online retailers can access this data in e-commerce via the digital asset management (DAM) functionality, thereby increasing their efficiency and profitability. Customer-specific portals with user-defined products, prices and elements of the respective corporate design can thus be generated directly from the cloud. Thus, the weclapp ERP platform is also meaningfully supplemented with regard to the important business process areas PIM and DAM of the weclapp customers, and receives further starting points for the stronger enrichment of the business processes with artificial intelligence Technologies.

Recently, ITscope has also been offering IT service providers the possibility to design individual XaaS products (short for Anything as a Service) and bundle them with their own services as well as items from the platform’s comprehensive ITC catalogue.

The business activities of ITscope will be continued by the current managing directors and under the existing brand. The Karlsruhe location will remain. The development of joint new offers is in preparation.

 

Further Information: 
Dr Joachim Fleing
Investor Relations
3U HOLDING AG
Tel.: +49 6421 999-1200
Fax: +49 6421 999-1222
E-mail: ir@3u.net

About 3U:
3U HOLDING AG (www.3u.net) has its headquarters in Marburg, Germany, and was founded in 1997. It is the operating management and investment holding company at the head of the 3U Group. It acquires, operates and sells companies in the three segments of ITC (Information and Telecommunications Technology), Renewable Energies and SHAC (Sanitary, Heating and Air Conditioning Technology). The 3U Group has successful and profitable business models based on megatrends in all three segments. It continues to expand its business activities dynamically, particularly in its strongest growth areas of cloud computing and online trading, in which it is striving to achieve leading positions in the market.

3U HOLDING AG’s shares are traded on XETRA, Tradegate and on the German regional stock exchanges (ISIN: DE0005167902; identifier: UUU).

weclapp is “ERP System of the Year” and among the winners of “Growth Champions 2021”

  • FOCUS Business economic journal and Statista distinguish fast growing companies
  • weclapp again awarded as ERP System of the Year
  • For the first time weclapp annual financial statements audited according to IFRS, annual report published

Marburg, 15 October 2020 – weclapp SE, a subsidiary of 3U HOLDING AG (ISIN DE0005167902) now received two coveted awards. In the competition “Growth Champions 2021” of the magazine Focus Business in cooperation with Statista, weclapp SE with its cloud-based ERP platform of the same name took top places on 13 October 2020. On October 14, 2020 weclapp received the certificate as “ERP System of the Year”. Already in the years 2016 to 2018 weclapp had won this award in the competition of the same name under the auspices of the University of Potsdam and was among the finalists in 2019.

“ERP System of the Year”

A top-level expert jury moderated by Prof. Dr. Norbert Gronau, University of Potsdam, awarded this year’s prize “ERP System of the Year” (https://system-des-jahres.de) after careful preliminary examination of the written applications. The list of criteria comprised eight categories: Implementation methodology, concrete customer benefit, research and development, customer communication, suitability for the industry, functions, ergonomics and technology. 13 companies were shortlisted and were given the opportunity to elaborate on three of the criteria in a competitive presentation.

Using the example of an ongoing project in a renowned automotive group, Ertan Özdil, CEO of weclapp SE, explained in detail the advantages of the cloud-based ERP platform during the introduction of the system. The migration from a legacy system to an enterprise software of the latest generation (ERP 3.0), as he showed in his presentation, can be executed significantly faster and smoother with weclapp than with conventional ERP systems. The technological advantages of the platform and the customer-friendly ergonomics were also explained in detail.

“For years, weclapp has been regularly awarded as one of the best ERP systems in Germany, if not the best. Our customers set the pace in our ongoing development, just as our system generates the impulse for our customers’ teams in their business processes. The daily enhancement of the system is one of our success factors”, emphasises Ertan Özdil, “And because the customers confirm with their daily work that we deliver an ingenious system, we can continue our rapid and profitable growth course uninterrupted in the coming years”.

“Growth Champion 2021”

weclapp’s growth to date was also registered by business magazine FOCUS and Statista, who included weclapp for the first time in their list of the 500 fastest-growing companies in Germany. The ranking is the result of a cross-sectoral, independent evaluation of a much larger sample by Statista. It is intended to honour the achievements of the companies, because “they give important impulses to the economy and society, create new jobs, act as innovators and thus secure Germany as a business location in the long term”, as FOCUS and Statista state. Ranking 13th in the IT sector and 65th among the top 500 of the 15,000 companies evaluated in detail, weclapp ranks among the top German growth companies. The complete company ranking was published in the FOCUS Business edition of 13 October 2020 as well as on www.focus.de and de.statista.com.

Annual Report 2019

In order to further improve the transparency of the status and prospects of its business, weclapp SE for the first time presents annual financial statements and management report according to IFRS, which have been certified without qualification. The annual report is available from today, October 15, 2020, on the websites www.3u.net, www.weclapp.se and www.weclapp.com.

Further information:

Dr. Joachim Fleïng
Investor Relations
3U HOLDING AG
Tel.: +49 (0) 6421 999-1200
Fax: +49 (0) 6421 999-1222
E-mail: ir@3u.net

About weclapp:
weclapp SE was founded in 2008 and offers since 2013 the cloud-based platform of the same name. Since market entry it has grown by an average of 50% each year and is operating profitably. With Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) it addresses mainly small and medium-sized companies, especially with the integrated ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and CRM (Customer Relationship Management) functionalities. Customers thus have unlimited access to their business transactions and data from any Internet-capable end device and from any location connected to the Internet. With storage and computing capacities in Germany and Switzerland and the certification according to ISO 27001, weclapp offers a high degree of data security. The platform has repeatedly been awarded the title of ERP system of the year. The weclapp SE is based in Frankfurt am Main with further locations in Marburg and Kitzingen. It is a subsidiary of the 3U HOLDING AG based in Marburg.

About 3U:
3U HOLDING AG (www.3u.net) has its headquarters in Marburg, Germany, and was founded in 1997. It is the operating management and investment holding company at the head of the 3U Group. It acquires, operates, and sells companies in the three segments of ITC (Information and Telecommunications Technology), Renewable Energies and SHAC (Sanitary, Heating and Air Conditioning Technology). The 3U Group has successful and profitable business models based on megatrends in all three segments. It continues to expand its business activities dynamically, particularly in its strongest growth areas of cloud computing and online trading, in which it is striving to achieve leading positions in the market.

3U HOLDING AG’s shares are traded on XETRA, Tradegate and on the German regional stock exchanges (ISIN: DE0005167902; identifier: UUU).

weclapp SE acquires German start-up FinanzGeek

  • New tool for self-employed and micro-enterprises unlocks additional market segment for weclapp
  • Market launch planned for the first half of 2022

Marburg, 14 October 2021 – weclapp SE, a subsidiary of 3U HOLDING AG (ISIN DE0005167902), has acquired all shares in FinanzGeek GmbH, Worms, for a cash consideration of less than EUR 1 million. The cloud-based software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution of the same name is on the verge of entering the market; around 300 interested persons are currently using a free trial version. It offers self-employed persons and micro-enterprises essential advantages of a comprehensive business software, is geared to the needs of this market segment and can be used regardless of industry. FinanzGeek customers receive a detailed overview of their key figures in the areas of finance, projects, customer and employee satisfaction. This allows business processes to be handled digitally and effectively. Alarm and notification functions help to constantly improve the company’s Success.

Final development steps will be carried out with the cooperation of the founders of FinanzGeek within the weclapp organisation. Active marketing is then to begin immediately and is planned for the first half of 2022 at the latest. It is expected that thanks to this expansion of the scope of services, the number of active clients of the weclapp group will increase at an accelerated rate. This does not only concern users who are acquired in direct sales via finanzgeek.de; test users who are looking for suitable solutions on weclapp.com will also be provided with an easy and cost-effective gateway solution.

Ertan Özdil, CEO of weclapp SE, sees considerable potential: “About half of the medium-sized companies are self-employed and micro-enterprises with less than five employees. On our way to becoming the world’s preferred cloud-based business solution for SMEs, we do not want to neglect this customer group. The acquisition of FinanzGeek provides us with a fast, promising access to this market segment. Small customers for whom weclapp is too extensive can work efficiently with the help of FinanzGeek; customers who grow out of FinanzGeek we shall welcome on the weclapp platform just as we do now all medium-sized businesses.”

 

Further Information: 
Dr Joachim Fleing
Investor Relations
3U HOLDING AG
Tel.: +49 6421 999-1200
Fax: +49 6421 999-1222
E-mail: ir@3u.net

About 3U:
3U HOLDING AG (www.3u.net) has its headquarters in Marburg, Germany, and was founded in 1997. It is the operating management and investment holding company at the head of the 3U Group. It acquires, operates and sells companies in the three segments of ITC (Information and Telecommunications Technology), Renewable Energies and SHAC (Sanitary, Heating and Air Conditioning Technology). The 3U Group has successful and profitable business models based on megatrends in all three segments. It continues to expand its business activities dynamically, particularly in its strongest growth areas of cloud computing and online trading, in which it is striving to achieve leading positions in the market.

3U HOLDING AG’s shares are traded on XETRA, Tradegate and on the German regional stock exchanges (ISIN: DE0005167902; identifier: UUU).