(1) Solely a natural person having legal capacity without any restrictions may be a member of the supervisory board. A person who, as a person under custodianship as concerns matters of their property, is subject wholly or in part to a reservation of consent (section 1825 of the Civil Code), is prohibited from being a member of the supervisory board.
(2) No-one may be a member of the supervisory board who
1. is already a member of the supervisory boards of 10 trading companies obligated by law to form a supervisory board;
2. is a legal representative of an enterprise controlled by the company;
3. is a legal representative of some other share capital company, the supervisory board of which counts a member of the management board of the company among its members; or
4. was a member of the management board of the same listed company in the course of the past two years unless they are elected upon having been nominated by stockholders holding more than 25 per cent of the voting rights in the company.
A number of up to five of the seats on the supervisory board are not to be included in computing the maximum number pursuant to sentence 1 no. 1 that a legal representative (in the case of a sole trader: the business owner) of the controlling enterprise of a group of enterprises holds in the trading companies forming part of the group that are under obligation to form a supervisory board. The memberships in supervisory boards within the meaning of no. 1, in which the member in question has been elected chairperson, are to be counted double in establishing the maximum number pursuant to sentence 1 no. 1.
(3) The other personal pre-requisites to be fulfilled by the members of the supervisory board representing the employees as well as the further members are governed by the Employee Co-Determination Act, the Act on Employee Co-Determination in the Iron- and Steel-Producing Industry, the Supplementary Co-determination Act, the Act on One-Third Employee Representation in the Supervisory Board, the Act on Employee Co-Determination in the Case of a Cross-Border Merger, and the Act on Employee Co-Determination in the Case of a Cross-Border Change of the Legal Form or of a Cross-Border Division.
(4) The by-laws may demand the fulfilment of personal pre-requisites only by those members of the supervisory board who are elected by the general meeting without the latter being bound by nominations, or who are delegated to the supervisory board by reason of the by-laws.
(5) In the case of companies that are public interest entities as defined in section 364d sentence 2 of the Commercial Code, at least one member of the supervisory board must have expertise in the field of accounting and at least one further supervisory board member must have expertise in the field of auditing accounts; the members of the supervisory board as a whole must be familiar with the sector in which the company pursues its activities.