page_title: Merck Group
section_title: 20th Century activities
hierarchical_section_title: Merck Group / History / 20th Century activities
caption_attribution_description: English: Merck KGaA, headquarters in Darmstadt, Germany, Frankfurter Strasse 250. The pyramid is the visitors' entrance. The "Green Tower" was designed by Friedrich Pützer and was finished in 1905. Deutsch: Das Hauptquartier der Merck KGaA in Darmstadt in der Frankfurter Straße 250. Die Pyramide ist der Besuchereingang. Der „Grüne Turm“ („Beamtenturm“) ist ein Bauwerk von Friedrich Pützer und wurde 1905 fertiggestellt.
context_page_description: The Merck Group, branded and commonly known as Merck, is a German multinational pharmaceutical, chemical and life sciences company headquartered in Darmstadt, with about 56,000 employees and present in 66 countries. The group includes around 250 companies; the main company is Merck KGaA in Germany. Merck was founded in 1668 and is the world's oldest operating chemical and pharmaceutical company, as well as one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world.
  Merck operates in Europe, Africa, Asia, Oceania and the Americas. It has major research and development centres in Darmstadt, Boston, Tokyo and Beijing. Merck pioneered the commercial manufacture of morphine in the 19th century and for a time held a virtual monopoly on cocaine.
  Merck was privately owned until going public on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange in 1995 and is listed on the DAX index of Germany's top companies. The Merck family still controls a majority of 70.3% of the company's shares. The Merck Group includes around 250 companies in 180 countries; the current main parent company of the group, since 1995, is named Merck KGaA, and is itself mainly owned by the former main parent company, E.
context_section_description: In the years of the Nazi rule, the company was led by Karl Emanuel Merck who became a member of the Nazi party in 1933 and subsequently received the title of Wehrwirtschaftsführer. In addition, Merck was president of the Hessian Chamber of Commerce and Industry as well as performing an advisory function in the Expert Advisory Council for National Health ("Sachverständigenrat für Volksgesundheit") of the NSDAP. During World War II, Merck was manufacturing war essential products such as narcotics, vitamins, biocides and other chemicals. According to the company's account, 265 forced laborers were working in the plant in Darmstadt, most of them women from Russia and Poland. Additionally, several hundred Fremdarbeiter ("foreign workers") from France and Belgium were employed throughout the war years. An air raid on the 12. December 1944 destroyed nearly 70 percent of the plant and killed 55 employees.
  In 1973, Merck Ltd. acquired BDH Chemicals from the Glaxo Group.
  In the early 1980s Merck Group built a visitor center at its Darmstadt headquarters that featured a pyramid, the design of which was controversial.
  Merck was legally named E. Merck oHG until 1995. In 1995 it was listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and became a KGaA, legally named Merck KGaA.
  Merck KGaA established its philanthropic foundation in 2008 called Merck Foundation and Rasha Kelej currently serves as its CEO.
caption: Merck visitor centre in Darmstadt, which stood from the early 1980s to around 2015
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