Since July 1, 2014, Luis López-Remón (57) is heading the business unit Leather (LEA) of specialty chemicals company LANXESS. He succeeds Markus Eckert, who is now fully concentrating on his role as head of the group function Corporate Development (DEV), which he took over already in March 2014.

The Leather business unit is part of LANXESS’ Performance Chemicals segment and has about 1,650 employees worldwide and production sites in Leverkusen (Germany), Filago (Italy), Rustenburg, Newcastle, Merebank (South Africa), Zárate (Argentina), Changzhou and Wuxi (China).

LANXESS is the world’s only company to cover the entire value creation chain for leather chemicals. Leather chemicals are used to optimize the properties of the leather material such as its softness, water resistance, as well as ability to conceal minor defects and reduce soiling.

López-Remón was born in Spain in 1957 and studied economics at the University of Wuppertal, Germany. He followed this up with postgraduate studies at the Institut Européen d'Administration des Affaires (INSEAD) in France.

López-Remón began his professional career in 1984 at Pall Filtrationstechnik in Frankfurt, Germany. Between 1986 and 2003, he worked for AirProducts and Chemicals, Inc. (APCI), where he held top positions in sales and marketing. López-Remón then became the General Sales and Business Manager at Air Products Polymers, a joint venture between Air Products and Wacker Chemie that he was instrumental in establishing and integrating.

López-Remón joined Bayer Chemicals as head of Regional Coordination in 2003, and was in charge of two Board initiatives. From January 2004 until the end of 2006, he headed up LANXESS’ Textile Processing Chemicals business unit and since 2007 was the head of the Rubber Chemicals business unit.