Press release November 27, 2009

Changes in Viking Line management

Pavlos Ylinen has been appointed Deputy Managing Director of Viking Line Abp.

The Board of Directors of Viking Line Abp has appointed Pavlos Ylinen, Master of Social Sciences and Master of Science (Shipping, Trade and Finance) as Deputy Managing Director in charge of the Group’s sales and marketing. He will succeed Boris Ekman, Deputy Managing Director and Chief Marketing Director, who will retire on March 15, 2010. Mr Ylinen is joining the Company in January.

Since 2001, Mr Ylinen has worked at the Itella Group (formerly Finland Post) in various positions, most recently as Managing Director of the customer relationship marketing company Itella Asiakkuusmarkkinointi Oy.

“The appointment of Pavlos Ylinen is an important step in the ongoing generation shift in the management of Viking Line. We are happy that the Company has recruited a dynamic person with international experience of management tasks in sales and marketing,” says Mikael Backman, Managing Director and CEO-designate, who will succeed Nils-Erik Eklund, the current Managing Director and Chief Executive, at Viking Line’s Annual General Meeting in February 2010.

“I am extremely pleased to be moving to such a market- and customer-oriented company as Viking Line. The Company has a strong, well-known brand that is a leader on the northern Baltic Sea. Viking Line also maintains a very high level of quality in its management systems and operational processes, for which it was recently recognized by being selected as the winner of the Finnish Quality Award 2009,” Mr Ylinen says.

Jan Hanses, Deputy Chief Executive, and Kent Nyström, Finance Director (CFO), will continue as Viking Line’s other Deputy Managing Directors.

Change in the management of the Finland and Baltic countries market areas
Pekka Ahlgren, who will continue to serve as Sales Director for the Turku and Tampere region of Finland, has been appointed as Director of Marketing and Sales in Finland and the Baltic countries. Mr Ahlgren will report to Pavlos Ylinen, Deputy Managing Director, and will take over responsibility for the Finland unit at the beginning of 2010. At the same time Risto Peltola, Marketing Director for Finland and areas outside Scandinavia, will assume the position of Senior Advisor until his retirement in February 2011.

Viking Line Abp

For further information, please contact:

For further information, please contact:
Mikael Backman, Managing Director and CEO-designate, tel. +358 18 27 000
Boris Ekman, Deputy Managing Director, tel. +358 18 27 000
Tuomas Nylund, Director of Corporate Communications, tel. +358 9 123 52 72 or +358 40 551 44 47

Viking Line Abp is a public limited company and the market leading brand in passenger and car ferry traffic on the northern Baltic Sea. Its mission to provide large-scale, affordable, safe passenger and cargo carrier services including first-class recreation, good food and attractive shopping. Viking Line’s service area is the Baltic Sea, with Finland, Sweden and the Baltic countries as its main markets. Its fleet consists of seven vessels. During fiscal 2007/2008, sales were about EUR 475 M. The number of passengers totalled 6.2 million and the average number of employees was 2,994.