Friedrichshafen, Germany — Reifenhäuser GmbH & Co. KG, the leading Germany-based manufacturer of extrusion lines and systems, is broadening its scope.
Ulrich Reifenhäuser said that in addition to producing extrusion lines, the company would now also expand into the production of components.
Earlier this year, at NPE2018, the company presented its new business unit Reifenhäuser Extrusion Systems, specifically established for the development and manufacture of screws, barrels, film tools, extruders, screen changers, spunbond fabric tools and spinnerets. The new unit was established following the acquisition of EDS GmbH, an international supplier of high-end extrusion tools and special dies.
"With that acquisition, we also gained a huge amount of valuable design expertise in dies and film tools," Reifenhäuser said. It also made it possible for the company to realize its goal of designing and producing components in-house.
In the past, Reifenhäuser only supplied extruders and dies for its own lines. That, however, is about to change.
"We are currently in the process of investing 10-plus millions of euros in our company in Troisdorf," he said. "We have torn down a number of old, outdated halls, literally in the middle of the company, and are replacing these with a new, modern facility equipped with sophisticated, state-of-the-art toolmaking — milling, drilling — machines to manufacture technologically advanced dies and extruders to sell as single units, which includes upgrades in competitors' lines."
The move, he said, was designed to allow the company to reach a "much, much" bigger market, beyond the core of existing customers for its extrusion lines.
"We will convince customers with the quality of the products and surprise them with our delivery times and prices," Reifenhäuser said.
Uwe Gaedike, the former director of Enka Tecnica, one of the companies absorbed into Reifenhäuser Extrusion Systems, is the highly experienced managing director of the new business unit and a "top technical expert" in this area, he emphasized.
"This new business is being developed next to the continual, ongoing improvement of our line technology and our new 4.0 strategy, which is now also starting to yield the first — standalone — results. We are making progress toward development of a platform, but I am very confident that we will have more interesting news about this next year at the K show."
