Plansee Group's sales grow by 26 per cent

This represents a 26 per cent increase on the previous year and has allowed the Plansee group to commit record levels of investment capital to develop its manufacturing and research and development activities across the board - record capital expenditure of around €150 million was made, the majority of this directed to product and process development as well as measures to improve production capacity and operational excellence. The Plansee Group is committed to the continuous development of new products, with Michael Schwarzkopf, chairman of the executive board, stating that products developed within the past five years account for 30 per cent of the Group’s total sales. While much of the growth has been through organic means, the creation of the PMG Group through the merger of Plansee’s and Mitsubishi’s sintered steel activities has created one of the world’s leading suppliers of powder metallurgical products to the automotive industry. The Group’s consolidated headcount rose from 4,600 to 5,050. The merger of the Plansee and Mitsubishi Materials Corporation’s powder metallurgical (PM) businesses took place on December 1, 2005, creating a group with a global presence with 11 manufacturing plants and 2,400 employees with sales of sales of €340 million last year. “Following the recent merger, all three divisions – PLANSEE High Performance Materials, CERATIZIT and PMG – are now among the leading suppliers worldwide, and the first phase of our global market positioning strategy has been accomplished,” said Mr Schwarzkop. Picture: CERATZIT's HyperCoat C