Mehiläinen to strengthen its board with two new Finnish members

Mehiläinen Oy will strengthen its board with two members. Leena Laitinen, M.Sc. (Econ.), age 43, and Juhani Laakso, M.Sc. (Econ.), 30, have been selected to sit on the Mehiläinen Board from 4 September 2013.

Leena Laitinen has just been selected as CEO of Snellman Group. She will take up that position on 1 January 2014. Laitinen’s previous work includes handling management duties for the S Group for 18 years. She has broad experience in general retail work, chain operations, and grocery and general merchandise. Past positions include serving as the manager of the S Group’s utility retail and the Prisma chain, and in Estonia being the national manager for SOK and the CEO of AS Prisma Pere­market. Furthermore, she has been the Prisma manager for several regional retail co-operatives.

Juhani Laakso works as an investment manager with Triton, and he is currently a member of the board of such companies as Suomen Lähikauppa Oy. Laakso has worked at Triton since 2010, and before that he was a management consultant at Bain & Company. He has vast experience in consumer and service business also at an international level and is highly experienced in enterprise financing.

- We wanted to strengthen Mehiläinen's board with a new member, and I'm very pleased to have Leena Laitinen's vast experience in chain operations, the consumer market, and brand management. Juhani Laakso’s expertise supplements Mehiläinen’s board excellently, bringing a lot of knowledge of international service business. We want to develop Mehiläinen strongly as a Finnish business, especially as the primary option for social and health care services for all customer groups”, says Mikael Lilius, Chairman of the Board of Mehiläinen Oy.

For more information, please contact:
Mikael Lilius, Chairman of the Board of Mehiläinen Oy
Contact requests can be sent by e-mail to susanne.gronroos@mehilainen.fi

Mehiläinen Group is the best-known and most highly regarded private provider of social and health care services in Finland. Mehiläinen’s nationwide service network offers versatile social and health care services for private, corporate, and municipal customers. Established in 1909, Mehiläinen employs approximately 6,000 professionals. In 2012, the turnover of the Mehiläinen Group was 256.4 million euros. Mehiläinen belongs to the Nordic Ambea Group, which is one of Europe’s largest providers of health and nursing services. www.mehiläinen.fi