Local court confirms provisional self-administration of Social Chain AG

Berlin, 25 July 2023. The Management Board of Social Chain AG today filed an application for the opening of insolvency proceedings in self-administration. The court has granted the application and ordered provisional self-administration.

In the self-administration proceedings, the Management Board of Social Chain AG, which the Supervisory Board has since reappointed, remains authorised to act and instruct:

In order to address the complexity and legal challenges of the self-administration proceedings, the lawyers Prof. Dr. Gerrit Hölzle and Dr. Thorsten Bieg from the law firm GÖRG, who have experience in restructuring, were appointed to the board in place of the board members Dr. Georg Kofler (CEO) and Stefan Kiwit (COO), who resigned. Andreas Schneider remains on the board of Social Chain AG as CFO.

In previous years, the two new board members have successfully assisted a large number of companies through various crises. For example, they worked for the Hamburg-based wind turbine manufacturer Senvion, the automotive supplier KSM Castings Group and the fashion brand Bonita (formerly Tom Tailor Group). Prof. Dr. Gerrit Hölzle emphasises: "The self-administration proceedings only apply to Social Chain AG, which acts as the holding company. The other companies of the group are not in proceedings, but will be reviewed by us in the coming days and weeks."

The local court has also appointed the Berlin based lawyer Friedemann Schade from the law firm BRL as the interim administrator of Social Chain AG. His task will be to monitor the entire self-administration proceedings on behalf of the court and to protect the interests of all creditors.

DS Group and drtv.agency GmbH are not affected

As already communicated, the insolvency proceedings do not affect DS Holding GmbH and its subsidiaries (DS Group) in particular. The entire DS Group is independent in terms of personnel, space and organisation and is financially separated from the parent company by notarial agreements, amongst others. All companies of  DS Group will therefore continue their business operations as usual.

drtv.agency GmbH is also not affected by the self-administration proceedings.

DIP loan from Ralf Dümmel and the long-term shareholders of DS Group

The self-administration proceedings and thus the provisional continuation of Social Chain AG became possible after Ralf Dümmel and the long-term shareholders of DS Group agreed at short notice to finance the company with a DIP loan.