The companies were turned into self-managed cooperatives.

The former GDR preferred to sell companies to preselected owners from West Germany. The companies were however sold at very low or in fact negative prices.

GDR was the first country to use a voucher privatization method. Unlike in other countries, the method led to very positive results (improved performance of the former SOEs).

GDR used direct sales based on auctions for its large-scale privatization – anybody was allowed to participate, value of the final bid was the only factor which mattered. The method was a success because of high revenues from privatization.