OREANDA-NEWS. Dr. Katja Scharpwinkel took over the position as head of the Automotive Refinish Coatings Solutions Europe business unit at BASF's Coatings division in Munster effective February 1, 2016. She succeeds Harald Pflanzl, who was appointed head of the BASF Group's Central Europe unit in Vienna effective the same date.

Scharpwinkel has held various positions throughout her career, primarily in marketing and sales at Ciba and Cognis. After BASF's acquisition of Cognis, she was first appointed head of Sales in the Formulation Technologies unit. Starting in February 2012, she managed the business of BASF's European distributor of specialty chemicals, BTC Europe.

BASF's Coatings division develops, produces and markets innovative automotive coatings, automotive refinishes and industrial coatings as well as decorative paints. We operate sites in Europe, North America and South America as well as Asia Pacific. Within this network, we collaborate closely with our customers all over the world. In 2014, the Coatings division achieved global sales of about EUR 3 billion.