PRESS RELEASE

100 years of better harvests – locations

CLAAS – around the World

Harsewinkel, January 2013 CLAAS has a total of eleven manufacturing locations meaning that it can meet the requirements of the various markets with its steadily growing product range. In doing so, the company is always guided by the demands of the world market, and it develops machines to meet the individual needs and conditions in the relevant country. Three regional centres, sixteen sales compa- nies and more than 1,000 sales partners in over 100 countries throughout the world ensure that sales, service and the supply of spare parts run smoothly and with extensive coverage.

The nucleus in Harsewinkel and the locations in Germany The CLAAS head office is in Harsewinkel, where as far back as 1919, "Gebrüder Claas" began to manufacture straw binders and where, in 1930, they also started to develop the combine harvester. These have been manufactured since 1936 and, to date, 440,000 units have been sold. After a com- plete reorganisation of the plant in 2003, it is now one of the most modern production plants for com- bine harvesters and forage harvesters in the world. Since 1992, visitors from all over the world have been catered for in the "Technoparc" which, in addition to the exhibition of new machinery, also hous- es amuseum that provides insights into the company's past. In 2010, a new technology centre was opened, whilst a new centre for sales and communications is to be inaugurated in 2013. Green harvest machinery and front attachments for JAGUAR forage harvesters are developed and built in Bad Saulgau. In addition to an ultra-modern production facility, the most southerly CLAAS manufacturing location in Germany is also home to one of the most modern test centres for forage harvesting and the centre of excellence for -implement automation. In 1969, CLAAS took over harvesting machinery manufacturer Bautz, a company located in Saulgau and, since then, it has been manufacturing green harvest machinery such as mowers, tedders, swathers and self-loading wagons in Upper Swabia. After it acquired chopping technology from the affiliated company Speiser in Göp- pingen, the manufacture of forage harvesters was added to its portfolio in 1970. Although the JAGU- AR forage harvester is built in the parent plant in Harsewinkel, a number of important components including the chopper headers come from Bad Saulgau. The system supplier for drive technology and hydraulics, CLAAS Industrietechnik (CIT) in , caters for customers in Europe and overseas. In addition to CLAAS machines, CIT also supplies other agricultural machinery manufacturers with axles. CIT's hydraulic systems are also used by manufac- turers of agricultural and construction machinery, the marine industry or the entire offshore sector. The Paderborn plant was established in 1956 as a plant for drive technology and hydraulic compo- nents and, at the time, it was the third CLAAS location after Harsewinkel and Christophorus-Hütte in

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Blankenhagen. In 1975, the company started to market hydraulic components under the name of CLAAS Industrietechnik externally. The plant for hydraulic components that was established in Schloss Holte near Bielefeld in 1960 was merged with the Paderborn production plant in the 1990s. Since its relocation from Bielefeld to Gütersloh, the latter has been home to CLAAS Agrosystems since 2009. In close cooperation with farmers, contractors and special users, software programs, sys- tem and machine components are developed and sold under the brand name AGROCOM among others. This division was founded in 1994 to produce systems and supply services aimed at optimising the management of farming businesses. The Parts Logistics Centre in Hamm caters for the supply of spare parts. The logistics centre was commissioned in the year 2000 and today over 135,000 parts are stored in an area comprising 40,000 square metres. There are also three major used machinery centres and a network of dealers and subsidiaries that ensure proximity to our customers throughout the federal German territory.

CLAAS – a journey through Europe France – In 1958, to provide greater capacity to meet the strong increase in demand for modern agri- cultural machinery, production of balers was moved from Harsewinkel to a new production plant for balers established in the French town of Metz and production. The first reciprocating plunger balers were produced in 1961 and, six years later, production of the first model of sliding plunger balers started up. Since 1969, the joint stock company has been trading under the name of Usines CLAAS France S.A., or UCF for short. The knotter, the core unit in any baler, has been manufactured in Lo- thringen since 1981. To date, over 280,000 balers have been manufactured in Metz, with each baler model being manufactured on its own welding and sheet metal processing line. In 2003, CLAAS acquired a majority shareholding in the French tractor manufacturer Renault Agricul- ture and, in addition to harvesting machinery, it has been offering a complete range of ever since. Most of the models are manufactured in the Le Mans plant, but there are two other locations in : Vélizy, at the south-west edge of the city, is home to the research and development division and the administration and procurement division for the tractor business, while the CLAAS France sales company has its headquarters in neighbouring Fresnes. Great Britain – The first combine harvesters were exported to England as far back as 1946. One year later, thirteen SUPER machine models were shipped to Mann & Son in Saxham. Since then, the com- pany has been the general CLAAS importer for Great Britain and Northern Ireland and remained so, even after the company was taken over by the Howard group in 1970 and in 1980 Mann & Son be- came a wholly owned CLAAS subsidiary. Basingstoke is home to CLAAS Financial Services Ltd. Italy and Spain – CLAAS has had representation in Italy since the 1950s when it was represented by the general agents CLAAS Cantone. The CLAAS sales company in Vercelli has catered for the agri- cultural machinery market in Italy since 1973. CLAAS Iberica caters for the Spanish market and is located in Madrid. This sales company goes back to the days of Agro-Mecanica which was awarded the import licence for combine harvesters in 1954. In 1969, the company's name was changed to the present one. 2

Austria – After decades of using a sales partner for market handling, CLAAS has been represented by its own regional centre in Spillern in the alpine republic since 2011. This centre handles sales and service in Austria, Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. The new spare parts stockroom, with 20,000 different spare parts items, was commissioned in 2012.

The journey continues – CLAAS in Eastern Europe CLAAS has had excellent business relations with going as far back as 1969. CLAAS Hunga- ria KFT has been a wholly owned subsidiary of the CLAAS Group since 1997. Almost all front attach- ments for combine harvesters built throughout the world are developed and manufactured in the Törökszentmiklós plant to the south east of . These include both drum mowers and cutter- bars which are manufactured in accordance with the mixed production principle, which involves manu- facturing different models simultaneously on one line. The current range of products also includes maize picker heads for harvesting maize, disc mowers for green forage harvesting as well as feed rakes and chaff spreaders for combine harvesters. Since the plant was taken over, several million euros have been invested in new buildings and manufacturing plants, most recently around 3.6 million euros for the construction of a research and development centre for cutterbar technology and a direct connection to the rail network for the plant. In the "Factory of the Year" competition, CLAAS Hungaria KFT in 2008 won the prize for "Best Production Plant in Eastern Europe". is becoming the third largest agricultural market in Europe. In order to take account of this development, CLAAS founded the sales and service company CLAAS Polska in 2009. The company's headquarters is in Buk near Poznan and, through a network of dealers, not only does it sell CLAAS machinery, it also supplies Polish farmers with spare parts and service. With reference to its available agricultural land, Romania is now number four in Europe. This positive development in the Romanian market resulted in the opening of a regional centre in Afumati near Bu- charest in 2012. The centre will provide support for all the sales partners in order to improve customer care by offering services and a nationwide supply of spare parts. The building has space for a spare parts stockroom with 8000 components over an area of 1850 square metres. As far back as the 1960s, CLAAS combine harvesters were being used in Romanian fields but the political circumstances brought business relationships to an end. After the border was opened in 1990, these were resumed meaning that CLAAS has been represented on the Romanian market for 22 years. CLAAS was the first big agricultural manufacturer to be operational with its own production plant in . With the laying of the foundation stone in 2004 and the plant opening in 2005, the company invested around 20 million euros in the construction of a new combine harvester plant in Krasnodar extending over an area of ten hectares. The plant is part of a production network which supplies the entire Russian Federation with combine harvesters. Some of the machine components come from German production lines with final assembly taking place locally. The production of the one thou- sandth combine harvester in 2008 saw the opening of the "Technoparc" customer centre where visi- tors can view machinery designed for the Russian market and is the first exhibition centre of its kind anywhere in Russia. Meantime, a large-scale expansion of the plant is being undertaken in Krasnodar.

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With CLAAS Vostok, the company has had its own sales company in Moscow since 2006 and, in 2012, it moved to new premises. This developed from the CLAAS offices set up ten years before. CLAAS has been operating in the Ukraine since 1994. Since the summer of 2010, the employees of the Ukrainian CLAAS company, CLAAS Ukraina DP, have been able to enjoy more pleasant sur- roundings and more spacious offices in new premises located in a modern building close to the centre of Kiev.

The leap across the pond CLAAS machinery has been in use in North America since the 1950s. In the middle of the 1960s, CLAAS awarded the tractor division of the Ford Motor Company sales rights for combine harvesters for the USA, and Mexico. However, since sales tended to be rather sluggish, the company founded its own import and distribution firm, CLAAS of America, in 1979 and the foundation stone was laid in 1981 in Columbus, . Since then, sales have been organised through independent sales partners. The production company CLAAS Omaha (COL) has been manufacturing the LEXION com- bine harvesters under the CAT brand name since 1999. Initially, the plant was run in cooperation with Caterpillar but since 2002 it has been under separate management. In San Francisco, CLAAS runs Financial Services LLC. CLAAS sold the first harvesting machinery in South America as far back as the 1950s. The sales company CLAAS S.A. was founded in the year 2000 in Sunchales and five further spare parts and service centres provide nationwide support in Argentina.

CLAAS in Asia Owing to its high population growth and strong position as an agricultural country, is an important and rapidly expanding market. Since 1992, CLAAS has been manufacturing the CROP TIGER com- bine harvester in Faridabad, a machine that was expressly developed for the Asian market because it can also harvest rice and is specifically suited to the damp soil prevalent in south east Asian countries such as India, or . In 2002, CLAAS India Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of the CLAAS Group, came into being from the joint venture company formed between CLAAS and the Indi- an group Escorts. In 2008, CLAAS opened a second plant in Chandigarh in order to cater for the rap- idly growing market for agricultural machinery. The rice and grain combine harvester, the CROP TIGER, is also manufactured there. Since then, a large spare parts and service centre has been set up in Bangalore in southern India. A subsidiary which caters for sales and service commenced operations in Beijing in 2012. Up until then, CLAAS had been operating with a separate representative in China, supplying the huge market through local dealers. A subsidiary with a central spare parts warehouse and a training and service location has gone into operation outside Beijing. Also in 2012, the CLAAS Regional Center South East Asia was founded with its headquarters in Bangkok. This provides sales partners with support throughout the South East Asian region. Thailand is almost as big as France in area and by far the biggest market in the region. 30 dealers from the new

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importer Asia Co. Ltd. provide nationwide coverage for sales, service and the supply of spare parts in Thailand. CLAAS is becoming increasingly internationalised, as proven by the new CLAAS companies in China and Thailand, new sales partners in South America and growth in the North American market. Never- theless, Europe, both west and east, will remain the focus of attention for CLAAS.

About CLAAS CLAAS (www.claas.com) is a family business founded in 1913 and is one of the world's leading manu- facturers of agricultural engineering equipment. The company, with corporate headquarters in Harsew- inkel, Westphalia, is the European market leader in combine harvesters. CLAAS is the world leader in another large product group, self-propelled forage harvesters. CLAAS is also a top performer in world- wide agricultural engineering with tractors, agricultural balers and green harvesting machinery. The CLAAS product portfolio also includes state-of-the-art farming information technology. CLAAS em- ploys around 9,000 workers worldwide and reported a record turnover of 3.4 billion euros in the finan- cial year of 2012.

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