Ad-hoc Press Release pursuant to Article § 15 Section 1 Securities trading Act (WpHG)

SURTECO AG has disposed of its wood-veneer production facility based in Everett (USA) to American company Edgemate Inc. during the course of portfolio optimization aimed at strengthening its Strategic Business Unit Plastics. This means that the specialist in surface technologies has disposed of a segment that contributed sales of only 7.3 million euros to the SURTECO Group, with a workforce of 58 people. The sale of veneer production completes the streamlining of the portfolio in North America, which led to the takeover of the Canplast Group in autumn of last year. SURTECO now has a market share in excess of 50 % in the North American market for plastic edging tapes. During the fiscal year 2004, SURTECO AG achieved sales of 380.4 million euros with its two strategic business units SBU Paper (edging strips, flat foils) and SBU Plastics (edgings strips, technical profiles (extrusions)) and significantly exceeded the result for the previous year by 7 percent. In 2004, the Group presented the best result in its history with an EBIT of 44.4 million euros (+19 %) and an EBT of 34.7 million euros (+28 %).