DENTSPLY International Announces Executive Retirement and Promotions.

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YORK, Pa.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 24, 2003

The Board of Directors of DENTSPLY International Inc., (NASDAQ:XRAY) today announced that Mr. John C. Miles II, 61, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, has indicated his intention to retire as Chief Executive Officer effective December 31, 2003. Mr. Miles will retain his position as Chairman of the Board. Mr. Gary K. Kunkle, Jr., 56, current President and Chief Operating Officer, will be promoted to Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer and Mr. Thomas L. Whiting, 60, current Executive Vice President, will be promoted to President and Chief Operating Officer, with both of these appointments taking effect on January 1, 2004.

Mr. John C. Miles II has a broad management background, with expertise in sales, marketing, manufacturing and finance. Since joining DENTSPLY in June of 1985, he has successfully occupied a number of senior level positions with increasing responsibilities. During his executive tenure, the Company grew five fold, going from revenues of $290.5 million in 1989 to revenues of $1.5 billion in 2002.

His first appointment was as Vice President and General Manager of the Trubyte dental prosthetics division. In 1986, he was named Vice President - European Operations with headquarters in Germany. Mr. Miles was appointed Senior Vice President - International Operations in September, 1987 with responsibility for DENTSPLY's global businesses in the United Kingdom, France, Italy, West Germany, Australia, Switzerland, Argentina, Brazil, Hong Kong and Japan, as well as the Latin American Export Division. In September, 1989, he was elected President of DENTSPLY. He was appointed Chief Operating Officer in 1990 and was also appointed to serve on the Board of Directors. He was appointed Chief Executive Officer effective January 1, 1996. In January, 1997, DENTSPLY's Board of Directors appointed Mr. Miles Vice Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. At the conclusion of the 1998 Annual Meeting of Shareholders, He assumed additional responsibilities as Chairman of the Board.

Mr. Miles was previously employed for seven years with Rhone Poulenc, Inc. of Monmouth Junction, New Jersey, where he was Senior Vice President and General Manager of their Systems Division. He was formerly with the Lee Filter Division of FDI, Inc. for a five-year period. During this time, he occupied several management positions and was Vice President and Division Manager for several years before leaving their employ in 1978. Before that, he held a variety of executive management positions with the Coty Division of Pfizer, Inc. and the Permacel Division of Johnson & Johnson.

Mr. Miles was born and educated in South Portland, Maine. He received his B.S. degree in industrial engineering from Lehigh University, and an M.B.A. degree from New York University. He is a member of the Board of Directors of Respironics, Inc., (NASDAQ:RESP) and the Inamed Corporation (NASDAQ:IMDC). He is Chairman-elect of the American Dental Trade Association and serves on the Board of the National Foundation of Dentistry for the Handicapped. Mr. Miles and his wife, Anna Maria, have four children and make their home in York, PA.

Mr. Gary K. Kunkle, Jr., joined DENTSPLY in January, 1997 as President and Chief Operating Officer and was appointed to the Board of Directors in March, 2002. He is a strong executive talent who has successfully guided the Company's day-to-day operations during a period marked by its most dynamic growth.

Under Mr. Kunkle's leadership, a number of significant projects were completed that have been of material value to the Company. A successful sales force expansion project was initiated in order to provide the Company with additional opportunities to personally present its broad product portfolio to decision makers. Today, DENTSPLY boasts more than 1700 technically trained field representatives on a global basis, far more than any other domestic or international dental manufacturer.

Centralized warehousing and distribution projects were also completed for both North America and Europe. This consolidated approach to distribution benefits both the Company and its distributor business partners. It yields higher customer service levels while employing generally lower overall inventories and increases DENTSPLY's ability to service distributors with complete order shipments.

A U.S. Shared Services project was completed that now includes all North American businesses. It has resulted in considerable savings in transaction processing costs, including accounts payable, employee expense reimbursement, payroll, customer invoicing, collection and cash application, sales tax compliance, fixed asset and general ledger accounting.

Additionally, the Company's Business Process Control Software (BPCS) was implemented on a worldwide basis. BPCS is a suite of Enterprise Resource Planning applications used to run nearly all aspects of DENTSPLY's global business, including manufacturing, order entry, distribution, finance and sales reporting.

Prior to 1997 Mr. Kunkle was with Johnson & Johnson, a premier global health care company. He was President of J&J's Jacksonville, Florida-based Vistakon division, which manufactures and markets the world's pre-eminent brand of disposable contact lenses, ACUVUE. Prior to his position with Vistakon, Mr. Kunkle was President of Johnson & Johnson Orthopaedics, Inc., a manufacturer of orthopaedic implants, fracture management products, and trauma devices. During his time there, he guided J&J Orthopaedics from a small company to a global player in that industry, with the number one brand in knee replacements. Prior to his appointment as President, Mr. Kunkle spent one year as Group Vice President, Operations, Marketing and Sales for J&J Orthopaedics and six years as their Vice President Marketing and Sales. He joined J&J as a sales representative for their Ethicon Division, and progressed through increasingly responsible sales management positions prior to being promoted to Director of Sales for J&J Orthopaedics.

Mr. Kunkle received his B.S. degree in marketing from the University of South Carolina, The Moore School of Business, where he was recognized as a distinguished alumnus in 2001. He has taken an energetic leadership role in business and community activities throughout his career. He is a member of the Board of the Perrigo Company (NASDAQ: PRGO) and is an active member of the American Dental Trade Association. He served as a Trustee and member of the Board of Governors for the Chamber of Commerce of Jacksonville, Florida, and was Chairman of the Contact Lens Institute of North America. He also served as Chairman for the United Way Campaign of Northeast Florida in 1996, was an active member of their Board of Directors and Board of Trustees. He was a member of the Board of Directors for INROADS, Board of Directors for the Genesis Health Foundation, and the Board of Governors of the Prevent Blindness Foundation. Mr. Kunkle is married and has four children and two granddaughters. He and his wife, Susan, and their two youngest daughters reside in York, PA.

Mr. Thomas L. Whiting was appointed to his current position as Executive Vice President in November, 2002 and has since been a valuable contributor to the Company's strategic planning and overall direction. He was responsible for two of the Senior Vice President positions and retained accountability for DENTSPLY Sankin in Japan and the global DENTSPLY Pharmaceutical business.

Mr. Whiting was the key executive involved in the acquisition of the dental injectible anesthetic assets of AstraZeneca and the establishment of the DENTSPLY Pharmaceutical business. He played an active role in the resultant transfer of the licenses and marketing authorizations required for the sale of the dental injectible anesthetics in most of the major world markets. Mr. Whiting has also supervised the largest capital project in DENTSPLY's history, the construction of its new pharmaceutical plant in Elk Grove Village, IL. When completed, the complex will have the capacity to produce up to 300 million cartridges per year, making it one of the largest facilities of its kind.

He joined the Company in March of 1987 as Vice President and General Manager of the Caulk dental consumables division. Under his direction, the division significantly expanded its research and development, sales and marketing activities and became the dominant dental consumables company in the United States. In 1994 Mr. Whiting was promoted to Senior Vice President and was accountable for the Company's business in Japan, China, Thailand, India, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, Argentina and Brazil as well as the Latin American Export Division. During this time, he developed and refined the country infrastructure of the Asian businesses and supervised the construction of the DENTSPLY manufacturing facilities in both India and China. In addition, he successfully managed the Company's endodontic franchise, an important segment of the business, as DENTSPLY is now the world's leading manufacturer and distributor of endodontic instruments and materials.

Prior to joining DENTSPLY, he held positions of increasing responsibility with Parks-Davis & Company and later with Deseret Medical, Inc., both Warner Lambert Companies. His latest assignment with Deseret was as General Manager for International, charged with directing all foreign operations in terms of their manufacturing, finance, marketing, sales and research and development functions. Before that, Mr. Whiting was Director of Materials Management at Deseret. Here he directed all activities related to production, inventory, purchasing, distribution, warehousing and customer service for both the domestic and international operations. He was formerly employed with Park-Davis & Company in a number of management positions, the last of which was as Director of Materials Management for the Med-Surg Division's three plants.

Mr. Whiting holds a Bachelor of Science degree in biology from Ferris State University in Big Rapids, MI. He is an active member of the American Dental Trade Association and is serving as Chairman of the 2004 Annual Meeting Program Committee. He and his wife, Char, have two children and make their home in York, PA.

DENTSPLY designs, develops, manufactures and markets a broad range of products for the dental market. The Company believes that it is the world's leading manufacturer and distributor of dental prosthetics, precious metal dental alloys, dental ceramics, endodontic instruments and materials, prophylaxis paste, dental sealants, ultrasonic scalers, dental injectible anesthetics and crown and bridge materials; the leading United States manufacturer and distributor of dental x-ray equipment, dental handpieces, intraoral cameras, dental x-ray film holders, film mounts and bone substitute/grafting materials; and a leading worldwide manufacturer or distributor of impression materials, orthodontic appliances, dental cutting instruments and dental implants. The Company distributes its dental products in over 120 countries under some of the most well established brand names in the industry.

DENTSPLY is committed to the development of innovative, high quality, cost-effective new products for the dental market.

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