Female CEOs in Germany Still Rare Even as Fresenius Medical Steps Up

(Bloomberg) -- Germany is doubling the number of women running its 40 biggest publicly-listed companies -- to two.

Fresenius Medical Care SE chose Carla Kriwet, 51, to succeed Rice Powell as chief executive officer in January 2023, according to a statement late on Tuesday. She's joining the dialysis giant from home appliances maker BSH Hausgeraete GmbH, where she also held the CEO post.

Kriwet's appointment will make it less lonely for her counterpart at Merck KGaA, Belen Garijo Lopez, 61, who broke the mold when she became CEO of Merck KGaA in May 2021. Yet, she and Garijo still stand out in corporate Germany.

While the country has a higher female labor-force participation than the average for industrialized nations, according to OECD data, getting those women on career paths that run all the way to the boardroom remains largely elusive. The reasons are varied. Significant numbers of women work part-time jobs -- 36.3% in 2019, compared with the OECD average of 25.4%. Observers also cite a tax regime that discourages two-career families, a scarcity of affordable daycare, and an economy reliant on manufacturing and male-dominated professions like engineering.

Germany, despite having a binding quota for women on supervisory boards in place since 2016, came in below average in the European Women on Boards Gender Diversity Index for 2021, ranking 12th out of 19, behind the U.K, the Netherlands, all of Scandinavia and Spain. Amendments to the law last year puts more onus on companies lagging on female leadership to explain their decisions. As it stands, Sweden counts three female CEOs in its OMX blue chip index of 30 companies, while the U.K.'s FTSE100 benchmark index counts eight.