DÜSSELDORF/ESSEN (dpa-AFX) - The new boss at Germany's largest gas importer Uniper is starting earlier than originally planned. British Eon energy manager Michael Lewis will take over as CEO as early as June 1, a month earlier than previously announced, according to a Uniper release Friday. The CEO post has been vacant since early March, after group CEO Klaus-Dieter Maubach stepped down.

German Carsten Poppinga will join the board in August - two months earlier than previously planned - and will be responsible for the trading division; he previously worked for trading company Statkraft Markets. The reason for the new start dates is that their previous employers let the two managers end their employment contracts earlier.

Uniper is considered systemically important. Among other things, it supplies around 500 municipal utilities and 400 large industrial customers. Until last summer, a large proportion of Russian gas imports to Germany went through Uniper. After supplies were cut off, Uniper floundered because of the high cost of replacing it and had to be rescued by the federal government./wdw/DP/jha