Batesville Holdings, Inc., Appoints Cynthia L. Lucchese Senior Vice President and Chief Financi...( BATESVILLE Ind. Jan. 21 /- Batesv...),Health

BATESVILLE, Ind., Jan. 21 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Batesville Holdings, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Hillenbrand Industries, Inc. (NYSE: HB), in conjunction with Hillenbrand's plans to separate its funeral services and medical technologies businesses, today announced the appointment of Cynthia L. Lucchese as senior vice president and chief financial officer for Batesville Holdings, Inc.

Batesville Holdings, Inc., is the present Batesville Casket Company's funeral services division of Hillenbrand Industries and will be renamed Hillenbrand, Inc., after the separation. Lucchese will assume leadership for all aspects of the future public company's accounting, external reporting, tax, financial planning, budgeting, treasury and investor relations.

Lucchese has extensive public company, executive and financial management experience. She most recently served as senior vice president and chief financial officer of Thoratec Corporation. Prior to joining Thoratec, she spent more than a decade with Guidant Corporation in a variety of senior financial management roles, including vice president and treasurer, corporate controller and chief accounting officer, and vice president of finance and administration for the Guidant Sales Corporation. She also spent seven years with Eli Lilly and Company and several years with the audit division of Ernst & Young. Lucchese holds a bachelor of science degree with distinction in accounting and a master's of business administration in finance from the Indiana University Kelley School of Business.

"Cindy brings senior-level experience with leading publicly traded companies and we are delighted to have someone of her caliber join our team," said Kenneth A. Camp, president and chief executive
'/>"/>