To whom it may concern:

Mr Ralf Lippold (date and place of birth: 25 June 1965, Mainz) was employed by our company from
1 March 2003 until 31 March 2008, initially as a process specialist at the BMW plant in Leipzig.

Following successful familiarisation with vehicle dispatch at the BMW plant in Regensburg until 30
June 2004, Mr Lippold mainly performed the following tasks:

• Adoption and continuation of best-practice business processes in the Department of

Vehicle Dispatch at BMW’s new plant in Leipzig
• Active assistance (including testing) in the development of a new tracking & tracing
program for vehicle dispatch
• Continuous improvement of business processes in the Department of Vehicle Dispatch in
close association with the logistics contractor and the Department of Assembly
• Integration and monitoring of the external contractor for vehicle dispatch

Remaining within the Vehicle Control Group, with effect from 1 May 2005 Mr Lippold’s role was
changed to that of production control process specialist. His responsibilities chiefly comprised:

• Operational production control monitoring and the continuous improvement of existing and
new control processes, including their standardisation
• The independent introduction and further development of new control processes and their
implementation
• The analysis and development of inter-departmental strategies for the achievement of
quality and throughput time aims with the intensive involvement of the departments
concerned
• Participation in problem-solving groups
• Cooperation in teams of specialists comprising representatives of different departments and
plants and representing the interests of vehicle control

In addition, Mr Lippold lent his support to other logistics and production control projects (e.g. F1-F2
simulation, F1-F2 control, reworking control, job data after F2).

From 1 December 2006 until 31 May 2007, Mr Lippold was temporarily deployed to support the
Department of Indirect Material Logistics as a materials control specialist, returning to his role as
production control process specialist as of 1 June 2007.

Mr Lippold is highly motivated to expand his knowledge. Apart from familiarising himself with new
IT systems relevant to production, at his own initiative he attended a number of internal further-
training courses (Negotiating Using the Harvard Principle; Personnel Change Management).
Furthermore, he attended external seminars on lean management methods conducted by the
Institute of Applied Manpower Studies (c/o Hydrometer AG, Ansbach), the Lean Management
Institute (Aachen) and the Kaizen Institute (Zug, Switzerland).

Acting both independently and successfully, Mr Lippold always met the requirements made of him
and purposefully discharged the tasks and responsibilities arising from day-to-day business to our
full satisfaction without losing sight of the results. He carried out important groundwork for
extensive future process optimisation in the area of production control within BMW's production
network (e.g. departmental capacity utilisation, logistical direct run quota, logistics monitoring and
barrier visualisation).

His sensitivity and negotiating skills coupled with his process expertise made a major contribution
to the discharge of his responsibilities and the accomplishment of the projects assigned to him.

Mr Lippold is always highly motivated and he quickly familiarised himself with new fields
enthusiastically and successfully. Mr Lippold always found good solutions to problems and
implemented them successfully.
Mr Lippold’s conduct vis-à-vis his superiors, colleagues and third parties was always impeccable,
objective and loyal.

Mr Lippold’s employment with BMW will end with effect from 31 March 2008 by mutual agreement.

We wish Mr Lippold every success in his professional and personal future.