40 years of Bausch + Ströbel
Last Saturday Bausch+Ströbel celebrated with a glittering gala for nearly 1,600 people, including "just" two friendly packaging machinery manufacturers and a handful of journalists, and otherwise exclusively for the workforce. Founder and boss Rolf Ströbel, the senior partner, founding father and shareholder Siegfried Bullinger and director Markus Ströbel all made the same point: "This party is in honour of our employees' achievements". In their speeches all three executives repeatedly emphasized the importance of the B+S workforce to the company's development and success, all the way to becoming world market leader for filling and packaging liquid pharmaceuticals.
The story of the present-day B+S Maschinenfabrik Ilshofen GmbH + Co. KG is a remarkable one: Ilshofen was the only council willing to allow the high-tech machinery manufacturer, founded as a garage start-up in 1967, to build a production facility within its municipal limits. Neighbouring councillors must regret their decision to this day, as this healthy company, which has never had to resort to lay-offs for operational reasons, has always paid taxes. According to information supplied by the company, B+S today has sales of around 100 million euros, about 90% of that in exports, and employs more than 900 people. Some 10,500 machines in 800 designs are on the world market as filling and packaging machines, principally in the pharmaceuticals industry. More than 650 trainees in 10 professions have already completed their apprenticeships in Ilshofen and over 300 of them still work for the company. As unassuming and energetic as Hohenlohe Franks are, neither Ströbel senior nor Bullinger could explain the secret of such success.
What is known, though, is that hard work and constant innovation have enabled the company to reach a whole series of milestones: starting in 1967 with the AFV 1000, an ampoule filling and sealing machine developed in?house, followed in 1972 by the first continuous version, the AFV 4005, which worked on the rotary principle and over 400 of which were sold. 1975 saw a fully automatic line for disposable syringes; 1983 brought the first WDM weighing and dosing machine with complete documentation, followed in 1989 by a CIP/SIP dosing pump. Next came entry into powder filling in 1992, in 1996 insulin filling using isolator technology and, in 1999, LSS laser sealing machines. Filling and sealing of 60,000 disposable syringes per hour with in-process control started in 2006. 2007 marked a change in the ownership structure, with the departure of the Bausch family.
From electroplating to parts production to circuit board manufacture and even to printing its own advertising and running a hotel for large numbers of international guests - the Hohenlohe Franks, like the people at Bausch+Ströbel, like to do it all themselves. With "brilliant prospects for the future we want to continue setting technical standards and building better machines than the market can offer to date", the management says.
