Netstal plans end to manufacture of fully hydraulic range

gradually will end production of its traditional SynErgy family of equipment. Company president and CEO Bernhard Merki says, however, the company has not yet set a date when the last full hydraulic injection molding press will leave the company's facility; he speculated that the phaseout could take up to three years.

Thereafter the company would continue to supply spares and service for all its full hydraulic units on the market. Merki says that the cost of energy has become such an issue with his company's customer base that electric machines or new hybrid units, which the company plans to premiere during this year's show in Düsseldorf [watch PlasticsToday for more reports on these developments], are in greater demand than full hydraulic units.

The 2008-2009 financial crisis didn't leave the company unscathed, he says, but he sees an inclination this year toward recovery thanks to Asian demand more so than from Western Europe or North America. "The effects of the crisis ... impaired the business development of the Netstal Group. [But] compared to companies in the same branch of the industry, Netstal was affected below proportion thanks to its ... position in the rather crisis-resistant application areas of packaging, closures, PET performs, and medical molding," says Merki. "In the financial year closed as of September 30, 2009, both the orders received and sales came down by approximately one fifth compared to the previous year."

To show how quickly markets change, Merki said that in 2000 40% of the company's turnover resulted from sales of injection molding equipment for the optical (CD and DVD discs) media sector. Today, due to direct downloading of music from the Internet, that market dried up, so that Netstal officially has exited machine manufacturing for this sector.

Surprisingly during the financial crisis, Netstal had its second best sales year (the best being 2000) in North American thanks to high demand from the packaging sector, lead by ultra-light caps and closures, and also packaging with inmold labeling. Although 66% of the company's business was transacted in Europe, the portion of sales to North America increased to 15% compared to the previous year. In Asia and the Middle East the shares decreased slightly and amounted to 7% and 4% respectively, compared to 2008.

The company's service segment now generates 20% of total sales. "Thanks to the stable market development, the share of the PET business rose to 26%, while the share of the core business (especially industrial/technical applications), on the other hand, came down to 54%," he says. Although he says the company has come out of the trough experience in 2009 and the company no longer has its staff working reduced hours, Netstal has yet to reach pre-crisis levels and won't until about 2011, he says. Orders received in the last eight months are 25% higher than in the same period a year before. —Matt Defosse