News Release

Carlyle Exits Andritz AG Through Successful Public Offering

2003-19

Munich/Vienna, 25th June 2003 – Global private equity firm The Carlyle Group, today announces its second exit from its €1bn European buyout fund, Carlyle Europe Partners.


The public offer of shares of Andritz AG to retail investors in Austria and the international private placement to institutional investors has been executed successfully. Andritz is one of the global market leaders for advanced production systems and services for pulp and paper, steel and other special industries.


The transaction results in a healthy exit for Carlyle from the investment, generating returns of two times the original investment for its investors.


A spokesman for Carlyle said, “This investment has been very successful for Carlyle and we are very pleased to be able to give back capital to our investors at an attractive return and in line with expectations.”


The Carlyle Group acquired Andritz in December 1999 in conjunction with other investors including Unternehmens Invest AG, Deutsche Beteiligungs AG, GE Capital, and Custos Privatstiftung. Carlyle invested equity of nearly €48 million from its European buy-out fund, Carlyle Europe Partners I.


“This successful public offering is the result of Andritz’ outstanding performance over the last four years. Through a combination of organic growth and complementary acquisitions, Andritz has significantly grown sales and profitability since 1999 while continuously improving its sound balance sheet structure,” said the Carlyle spokesman.


The offer size (including over-allotment option) was 6.1 m shares, and the offer price per share was set at €22.75. Due to this transaction the free float of Andritz increased to approximately 62% on the Vienna Stock Exchange.


“Through this successful placement we have achieved our goal of increasing the free float substantially from 15% after the IPO in 2001 to over 60% now and have completed the transformation of Andritz into a public company which began three years ago with the help of the group of financial investors. The partnership with The Carlyle Group and the other investors has been very beneficial for Andritz,” said Wolfgang Leitner, President and CEO of Andritz.


There was buoyant demand from renowned Austrian and international institutional investors as well as Austrian retail investors. The placement was managed by CA IB and JPMorgan as Joint Lead Managers and Joint Bookrunners and Erste Bank as Co-Manager.


The Carlyle Group and the other financial investors retain 10% of the Andritz shares.


About the Andritz Group


The Andritz Group, listed on the Vienna Stock Exchange in the Prime Segment/ATX since June 2001, is one of the global market leaders for advanced production systems for pulp and paper, steel, and other special industries. As at March 31, 2003, Andritz had a staff of 4,545 employees all over the world. It develops and makes these high-tech systems at 13 production sites in Austria, Germany, Finland, Denmark, France, Netherlands, USA, Canada and China.


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