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German prosecutors opened a criminal probe of SAP SE’s Chief Technology Officer Jürgen Müller after the company said he would step down at the end of the month due to “inappropriate” behavior.
Heidelberg prosecutors have opened a formal investigation into an allegation of s-xual harassment, a spokesman for the agency said in an emailed statement on Friday. The probe was opened after media reports that the manager allegedly improperly approached a female employee, according to the release.
Müller didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
The Walldorf-based software company announced last week that Müller would leave following an incident at a company event. SAP didn’t specify details about the nature of what happened.
SAP will fully cooperate with the investigation, the company said in a statement.
It’s not the first episode to raise concerns about the culture at SAP. Current and former employees have previously complained about incidents of bullying and harassment that keeps female employees in particular out of executive positions, as well as heavy drinking at events that has led to problematic behavior.
Müller, who was in charge of preparing the company to add more cloud computing customers and spearheaded SAP’s “business technology platform,” joined in 2013 and was named to the executive board as CTO in 2019. His contract was extended in April until the end of 2027.
Müller’s departure is the latest in a string of exits from the management board. Chief marketing officer Julia White and Chief Revenue Officer Scott Russell left SAP at the end of August. The churn comes after Chief Executive Officer Christian Klein started a major restructuring program at the beginning of the year to streamline the company, cut costs and increase its competitiveness in AI development.
The plan expects to cut or retrain between 9,000 and 10,000 employees this year, or as much as about 10% of its workforce.
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https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2024-09-13/german-prosecutors-open-harassment-probe-into-sap-s-muller
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