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SMS to close German injection molding machine siteSMS to close German injection molding machine site

November 17, 2005

3 Min Read
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High costs and, even more, slumping sales were cited as reasons the SMS group of companies (Düsseldorf, Germany) will close its Battenfeld Injection Molding Technology facility in Meinerzhagen, Germany in June 2006. SMS derives most of its sales from machinery for metallurgy and rolling mills for metal processing. The Meinerzhagen closure, which affects 470 employees, is the latest poor news from some leading European molding machine makers.

The Meinerzhagen facility manufactures Battenfeld''s large (above 1000-tonne clamp force) machines. A Battenfeld spokeswoman speaking at the Equiplast exhibition in Barcelona, Spain on Nov. 16 said the company plans to complete all current orders and close the facility in June 2006, but added that talks had not yet begun with union officials. The firm will continue to offer service and spare parts, though where and how that will be accomplished is not yet concrete. In the last year Battenfeld Injection Molding already had shifted all of its back-office operations to its other European manufacturing facility in Kottingbrunn, Austria. SMS owns the Battenfeld building in Meinerzhagen and is the city''s second largest employer.

In a statement, Heinrich Weiss, chairman of the management board at SMS, minces no words about the viability of the German plant. "The Meinerzhagen facility has caused high losses for many years in a row. All our attempts to make [it] competitive have proved to be unsuccessful," Weiss says. "We must consider the future of the group as a whole and therefore cannot continue to subsidize this facility." In early 2004 Weiss hired former Krauss-Maffei Kunststofftechnik CEO Wilhelm Schröder to run SMS''s plastics machinery, with a mandate to make the injection molding business profitable.

Battenfeld officials at Equiplast added that, long-term, the firm intends to continue manufacture of its larger injection molding machines in Kottingbrun, but short-term the firm will continue to make machines there only to 1000-tonnes.

Battenfeld plastics machinery also includes the Battenfeld Gloucester brand of blown- and cast-film lines, and the Battenfeld Extrusionstechnik and Cincinnati Extrusion sheet and profile extrusion lines. All of the extrusion businesses have performed well in 2005, said Hans Berlisk, marketing director at Cincinnati Extrusion (Vienna, Austria), who also was at Equiplast. His company met its financial goal for calendar year 2005 by October, he said, with sales of PVC sheet and window profile lines in the U.S. especially strong. The company only started sales there in January 2005 after completing a noncompete agreement with former Cincinnati Extrusion owner Milacron.

Battenfeld Injection Molding''s announcement comes only a month after competitor Demag Plastics Group (DPG; Schwaig, Germany) announced it would release about 100 employees, adding to the 130 or so it employees forced out earlier this year. In addition, local newspapers in Schwertberg, Austria report that molding machine manufacturer Engel Austria, headquartered there, is releasing about 90 employees from its three Austrian sites, from a total of about 2200 employees at the sites. Cincinnati, OH-based Milacron, which headquarters its Ferromatik Milacron injection molding division in Malterdingen, Germany, has also announced consolidation plans targeting European as well as U.S. operations, and has initiated negotiations with German unions, pending possible layoffs or closures.-Matt Defosse; [email protected]

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