Fusion
In the course of the succession arrangements of Regine Keller and Guido Hager, the two companies Hager Partner AG (Zurich) and Keller Damm Kollegen GmbH (Munich) have merged to form a new company since 01.01.2023: UNIOLA AG.
The merger idea was born during a walk Regine and Guido took together in Berlin's Tiergarten. This idea was the initial spark for an exciting process that both companies faced in 2022. During an initial meeting, many similarities between the two merger partners emerged (philosophy, organisation, etc.). Subsequently, the idea became a plan. Accompanied by various experts in merger matters, also in tax and legal issues, a strategy was worked out within the framework of which a joint new company now stands as the final result.
Patrick Altermatt and Franz Damm form the management, Andreas Albrecht and Annika Sailer are deputy managing directors.
Pascal Posset, Monika Schenk, Kirsten Littarru-Bachmeier and Emine Cej-Winkler are also members of the management.
The following site managers are also members of the management team: Andreas Kotlan (Berlin), Annika Sailer (Munich), Raphael Kugler (Stuttgart) and Andreas Albrecht (Zurich). ). Raymond Bulliard is site manager in Geneva.
The Board of Directors consists of Guido Hager, Regine Keller, Patrick Altermatt, Franz Damm and Pascal Posset.
The company is owned by the shareholders Andreas Albrecht, Patrick Altermatt, Emine Cej-Winkler, Franz Damm, Guido Hager, Regine Keller, Andreas Kotlan, Raphael Kugler, Kirsten Littarru-Bachmeier, Pascal Posset, Margareta Rothe, Annika Sailer, Monika Schenk and Nurettin Tüney.
During the merger process, we were able to find out what advantages a merger would offer both partners. Here, it was not the size of the future company structure that was relevant, but rather the potential of versatility in terms of content that was decisive. The individual locations (Berlin, Geneva, Munich, Stuttgart, Zurich) offer the chance to enable a familiar character for all employees despite the size and at the same time to guarantee a direct relationship with our local client base. The handling of the existing in-house knowledge is one of the greatest potentials of the new company ("swarm intelligence"). The networking of the individual office locations with each other leads in the end result to more content quality, which is secured by the large knowledge pool of the new company. In addition, a broader project portfolio across the entire professional spectrum of landscape architecture and urban planning reinforces this aspect.
At the heart of the new company are the people who fill the company with life through their commitment and work. At an early stage of the merger process, it was therefore clear that everyone should participate in the planned project. At the centre of this aspiration were 5 workshops, which were held in the summer of 2022 at the various office locations on different topics and were open to all employees. The workshops were again accompanied by external experts.
Expert: Elena Och
From 14 to 15 July 2022, the first workshop on the topic of "corporate culture" took place at the Zurich office. The subject of the workshop was the development of an adequate set of values within the framework of which we would like to shape our new company in the future. In an inventory analysis, we were able to narrow down the existing set of values to the terms: sustainable, green and social, and derive a catalogue of measures from this as to how we can implement and live this set of values both internally and externally.
Expert: Max Dätwiler
The second workshop to find a name for the new company resulting from the merger took place in Zurich from 22 to 23 July 2022. In individual working groups, various creative techniques (e.g. brain-writing ring technique) were used to develop a pool of ideas from different possible names for the new company. As a result of the workshop, an artificial name crystallised, which led to the new name of the company in a further revision after the workshop: uniola.
Expert: Christian Werler
On 22 August 2022, the third workshop on "Corporate Design" took place in Zurich. The aim of the workshop was to jointly develop parameters that form the basis of the future corporate image. In several work steps, the future brand characteristics that are to shape the appearance were derived. In addition, a possible colour canon was worked on and elements of the future corporate design proposed by the expert were checked for their consistency with the desired brand personality.
Experts: Nadine Heinrich, Alexandra Forciniti, Lina Ehlert
From 8 to 9 September 2022, the 4th workshop on "Corporate Communication" took place at the Munich office. Based on the analysis of an existing concept paper on external communication, a concrete approach for the communication of the planned merger was jointly developed.
Expert: Heidi Tiedemann
From 25 to 26 October 2022, the 5th workshop on the topic of "company organisation" took place at the Stuttgart office location. Different processes relevant to the future company, such as human resources, IT or quality management, were analysed in working groups and examined for any potential for improvement. For further deepening, a total of 8 working groups were set up for future consideration and the development of concrete measures for the individual topic areas and responsible contact persons were defined.