Wittmann: Market recovery remains elusive

With order income remaining at a relatively low volume and many of the markets in which the Wittmann Group operates still performing sluggishly, it very much looks like, in financial terms, 2024 will be ending not with a bang but with a whimper.

"From a financial standpoint, the year is almost over, and we don't see many surprises coming up. As we predicted at the Competence Days in June, we expect to achieve a revenue of between 360 million to 370 million euros, which translates into a minus of around 10 percent in general" said Michael Wittmann, CEO of Wittmann Group, speaking at a pre-Fakuma show press conference.

While overall sales showed a very slight 2 percent increase over the first nine months of last year, this was primarily due to sales of auxiliary equipment — "low-ticket items," said Wittmann — which tend to fluctuate less than those of the "big-ticket" machinery.

One surprising development has been the disruption of the slight upward trending line seen throughout the first seven months of the year. This came to a halt in August, he said. "I expected August to be slow, but it failed to pick up again in September. However, we are very hopeful that we will return to the previous trend seen in the first half of the year during the upcoming months. Let's say a little bit more normalization of the market. Currently it's just really, really low."

He added that, while October has performed slightly better compared to September, it has not reached the levels he expected. "In all honesty, I cannot say why this is happening; I don't understand it at all, and I have no explanation."

The current slump has already lasted two years, he pointed out. Orders started decreasing in September 2022. In the meantime, the market has undergone changes and adjustments. It must now only be a question of time before the market picks up again, he said.

The preview for 2025 is slightly positive, although the various different markets are, for the most part, currently still underperforming.

Michael Wittmann is hopeful that it will see an increase over this year in the range of plus 5 percent to plus 10 percent. He briefly summed the situation up, noting that Central Europe, and specifically Germany and Austria, were the true weak spots; North America could be better; and Asia is still weak. Yet although some positive developments are emerging in the countries of west and east Europe, in his view, what's really missing is an impulse for a quick recovery.

"Europe is starting more and more to look like a doughnut," he said. "We see more industrial activity in the countries on the outer border. We are also seeing some of the bigger projects moving out of Central Europe to the east. It is a tendency that in all likelihood will become more pronounced when the economy picks up. Right now, it is still on a small scale," Wittmann observed.

There are various reasons the recovery has failed to gain traction and various triggers that could help kick-start it, he added.

"One is the fact that industry interest rates are going down. I hope — we hope — that they will continue going in the right direction and that this will soon have the effect we want. It's not something that happens in a month; it takes time. Then there's the fact that in many countries, elections are taking place, which always creates uncertainty. Once these are over and people have clarity, they can start looking forward. And, of course, the geopolitical conflicts in the world contribute to the sense of unrest," he said.

The languishing automotive industry is another factor impeding recovery. As long as it continues to struggle, injection molding will as well. "We still depend heavily on the automotive industry," Wittmann said. "And to be frank, it is simply not doing as well as it should."

The market situation notwithstanding, Wittmann Group has continued to move ahead with its plans for expansion at its sites around the world. The company is currently in the process of gaining permission to build a second plant in Hungary and is expanding its facility in Turkey. New sales and service locations are under construction in Poland and Bulgaria, which are due for completion by the end of the year.

On Sept. 26, the groundbreaking ceremony for the expansion of the Wittmann Robot (Kunshan) Co., Ltd. production facility in China was held. The group is investing more than €10 million euros ($10.9 million) in realizing the first stage, with completion scheduled for October 2025. The total floor space including office facilities will be 15,000 square meters (161,000 square feet).

Wittmann Robot in Kunshan currently produces robots, temperature controllers, materials handling equipment, dryers and granulators. From next year, injection molding machines for the Asian market will be manufactured at the expanded facility as well.

In India, Wittmann moved its headquarters into a new building order in the Tiruvallur district of Chennai, about 9 kilometers (5.5 miles) from the previous location in Chinna Porur. The new facility is around twice the size of its previous headquarters, with a total of 5,000 square meters of office and production floor space available.

In Turkey, the group is continuing to expand its production facility on an ongoing basis.

At Fakuma this year, Wittmann Group (B1-1204) is highlighting the efficiency and performance of its array of offerings, said Rainer Weingraber, the CEO at Wittmann Battenfeld GmbH, including energy-efficient injection molding technology.

What does Wittmann expect from the show this year? "What we really like about the Fakuma show is the time we spend with our customers," said Michael Wittmann. "We enjoy the — sometimes very technical conversations — with them and the discussions give us the opportunity to learn from them as well about their needs, the product requirements and more. Having these high-level, high-quality conversations with our customers is an important part of being here."

But it also works the other way around, Weingraber added. "By showing our customers our new products, our innovations such as our energy-saving possibilities, we give them impulses, perhaps trigger them to think about lowering their CO2 footprint by buying energy-efficient equipment. We are looking forward to some awesome, good discussion."

At the stand, there is a path that guides visitors along all the exhibits, explained Weingraber.

In addition to all-electric machine models from the EcoPower and MicroPower series, a servo-hydraulic SmartPower with an electric injection aggregate will also be shown for the first time.

The machine, a SmartPower B8X 120/350H/130S with an electric injection unit, will be producing a bottle opener made of PC and TPE, using a mold supplied by FKT Formenbau und Kunststofftechnik, Germany, with a W918 robot from Wittmann and a conveyor belt integrated in the work cell. The robot inserts the metal parts fed from a magazine into the mold, where they are overmolded with polycarbonate. The resulting base body is subsequently passed on to the second station by a rotary unit and there overmolded with TPE to give it a better grip. The finished parts are then deposited on the conveyor belt of the Insider cell.

"We have a very compact robot and conveyor belt integrated into the work cell — something that is in very high demand with our customers — and we strongly believe this solution will fit the need of the market," said Weingraber.

Visitors to the booth will also be able to see Wittmann's new vacuum solution for linear robots, called EcoVacuum, which reduces compressed air consumption with a demand-based vacuum control, particularly when handling inserts or molded parts with a smooth surface. Following vacuum buildup, the Venturi nozzle will only come on again before the negative pressure becomes too low to hold the part safely in place. The vacuum limit values can be calculated individually for each specific part and controlled with Wittmann's r9 control system.

"Compressed air is the most expensive form of energy in most production plants," said Michael Wittmann. "And the r9 control system allows a completely free, programmable, definable vacuum level per circuit, allowing us to achieve potential savings of up to 80 percent compressed air consumption." Available for all Wittmann robots, it will be demonstrated with a Primus 128 robot.

Wittmann will also be displaying its further evolution in the use of DC energy as a power source for injection molding systems. Last year, the company showed a machine with a robot operating on direct current. This year, the temperature controller, too, can run on energy from the machine's DC intermediate circuit. Further DC-compatible auxiliary appliances are planned.

The EcoPower B8X 180/750 DC Insider cell with an integrated WX142 robot in DC version from Wittmann and a DC-compatible Tempro plus D temperature controller will be molding the housing of a plug-in connector for DC technology using a two-cavity mold supplied by Harting of Germany.

A finished connector of this type made by Harting is built into the machine and used to connect the Tempro plus DC appliance. Power is supplied by an ecological salt battery technology on a sodium-nickel basis from innovenergy. The battery has a total capacity of over 45 kWh, more than sufficient for uninterrupted machine operation throughout an entire eight-hour trade fair day. In addition, electrochemical capacitors, known as supercaps, will be used to complement the sodium-nickel storage units by balancing out short-term load peaks.

An energy-efficient EcoPower B8X 110/525 will also be running at the stand, producing dart tips made of POM, using a 32-cavity mold supplied by Hasco of Austria equipped with a pneumatic needle shut-off nozzle. The parts will be removed by a Wittmann robot and subsequently fed to a tubular bag system supplied by Ravizza Packaging of Italy for packaging.

Finally, the company will be displaying its microinjection molding capabilities. The MicroPower, designed for injection molding micro and nano parts, comes with a two-step screw-and-piston injection aggregate able to inject thermally homogeneous melt with shot volumes ranging from 1.2-6 cubic centimeters. This makes it possible to manufacture parts of outstanding precision in a maximally stable production process with minimal cycle times.

Another highlight is the liquid silicone processing application running at the booth of Austria-based Nexus Elastomer Dosing and Nexus Elastomer Molds (A6-6222), where an EcoPower B8X 110/350 LIM featuring an eight-cavity series production mold equipped with a Nexus "Timeshot" needle shut-off system will manufacture LSR piston stoppers for disposable syringes. These will be subsequently assembled fully automatically.

"One truly new element this year that has been introduced by Schall, the organizers of the show, is Career Friday," said Wittmann. The company is supporting the new program in various ways as much as possible.

"We invited schools from western part of Austria to the show, as we believe this is an exciting opportunity here to introduce our industry, the plastics industry, to young people and young professionals who might be looking to work in our industry. And in some cases, we are supporting the travel expenses of schools," Weingraber. "It's worth it if we can show young people what we do, encourage them to join our industry by showing them what it is we do."

Apprentices from the company will also be at the stand to share firsthand experiences with the young people and to talk about the career possibilities once the apprenticeship has finished.

"There are so many facets and aspects, and I personally think these are underrated in the public discussion about plastics," said Michael Wittmann. "We want to show them what's possible."