Klaus-Michael Kühne, a major shareholder and former chairman of the board of the Swiss logistics company Kuehne+Nagel International, passed away on Monday at the age of 89. Kühne, who was Germany’s second-richest person, controlled the publicly traded Swiss logistics company Kuehne+Nagel International AG through his majority stake in Kühne Holding as well as through Kühne Foundation.
Klaus-Michael Kühne began working at the family-owned company Kuehne + Nagel in 1958 and became chairman of the board of Kuehne+Nagel Speditions-Aktiengesellschaft in 1966. From 1975, he served as CEO of Kuehne+Nagel International AG, and from 1992 to 2011, he was Chairman of the Board. Since 2011, he has held the position of Honorary Chairman of the Board.
– The news of Klaus-Michael Kühne’s passing has left us all deeply saddened. Klaus-Michael Kühne embodied logistics and global trade like no other. On behalf of the board and the employees of Kuehne+Nagel, we extend our deepest condolences to his family,” said Stefan Paul, CEO of Kuehne+Nagel International AG, in a press release.
Throughout his career, Klaus-Michael Kühne played a key role in shaping global trade, and he contributed to modern logistics and the development of today's global supply chains.
Kuehne+Nagel is one of the world’s largest logistics companies, with approximately 88,000 employees at over 1,300 locations in nearly 100 countries. The company is headquartered in Switzerland and is listed on the Zurich Stock Exchange. Kuehne + Nagel was founded in 1890 in Bremen, Germany, by August Kühne and Friedrich Nagel.
