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Hiesinger quit last week after failing to win unanimous
shareholder backing for a deal to create a steel venture with
India's Tata Steel <TISC.NS>.
Kerkhoff, 50, will run the company until the process of finding
a Hiesinger's replacement is completed, Thyssenkrupp chairman
Ulrich Lehner said, adding that he enjoyed the "full confidence"
of the supervisory board.
Activist investors Cevian Capital, which holds an 18 percent
stake in Thyssenkrupp, and Elliott have called for an
across-the-board strategy review at the Essen-based industrial
conglomerate which makes everything from submarines to
elevators.
They are at odds with the Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach
Foundation, which owns a 21 percent stake and represent the
legacy of the company's late owner, whose last wish was for
Thyssenkrupp to remain whole.
The Krupp foundation's board met on Friday after facing
criticism from labor leaders that it had let down Hiesinger by
failing to back him in the wrangling over strategy that preceded
his resignation.
The foundation expressed its regret over Hiesinger's resignation
and said it "stands by" the company and its workers.
The task now ahead was to implement the steel venture with Tata
and develop other areas of the business. "The management board
headed by Mr Kerkhoff enjoys our full confidence," foundation
chair Ursula Gather said in a statement.
The prime minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, the German state
where Thyssenkrupp is based, Armin Laschet, is a member of the
foundation's board. On Thursday, Laschet backed Lehner in
rejecting a possible breakup.
Thyssenkrupp shares traded down 1 percent, making them the
second weakest stock in the 30-share DAX index <.GDAXI>.
(Reporting by Douglas Busvine; editing by Maria Sheahan, Jason
Neely and Jane Merriman)
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