Sonova fully subscribes to the principle of equal treatment of all shareholders, ranging from large investment institutions to individual investors. Registered shareholders receive regularly written information about the Group’s activities and performance and are personally invited to shareholder meetings. The Annual General Shareholders' Meeting (AGM) offers shareholders the opportunity to raise any questions regarding the development of the company and the events of the year under review.
When exercising voting rights, no shareholder can combine, with their own and represented shares, more than 10% of the total number of shares as shown in the Commercial Register (Art. 14 para. 2 of the Articles of Association, available here). Linked parties are considered as one person. This voting right restriction does not apply to founding shareholders. The Board of Directors may approve other exceptions if it has good reason to do so, in which case no special quorum is required.
According to Art. 14 para. 4 of the Articles of Association, every shareholder entered in the share register with voting rights may have his shares represented by a person with written authorization from him who does not need to be a shareholder, or by the Independent Proxy. All the shares owned by a shareholder can only be represented by one person.
The Articles of Association are available here.