Heidelberg Celebrates 60 Years of Stahlfolder Production in Ludwigsburg
Constant expansion of product portfolio and market position
In order to expand its global market leadership in the field of folding machines, Stahl acquired folding machine manufacturer Baumfolder in Sidney, Ohio (U.S.) in January 1991. This move established a production site in the U.S. and opened up the key American and Canadian markets. In the same year, Stahl also took over another U.S. company, saddlestitcher manufacturer Macey. 1994 brought the successful acquisition of McCain-Brehmer Buchbindereimaschinen GmbH in Leipzig. Brehmer manufactured folding machines, saddlestitchers, thread-stitching and thread-sealing machines. Today, Leipzig is the competence center for saddlestitchers and adhesive binders. In January 1999, Heidelberg acquired the Stahl Group along with the sites in Ludwigsburg, Leipzig and Sidney/Ohio. Stahl lived on in the product names and the Stahlfolder made its debut at drupa 2000. Since 2006, Heidelberg has been producing the KHC 78 and KHC 66 folding machines for the Chinese market at the Qingpu plant near Shanghai.
Postpress an integral part of the Heidelberg solution strategy
Particularly in these current times, postpress offers customers potential for optimization and value creation, and an opportunity to make themselves stand out from the competition. "Postpress is an integral part of our product portfolio and its share of sales is growing," says Stephan Plenz, Member of the Heidelberg Management Board responsible for Technology and Operations. "We are the only manufacturer to offer our customers complete solutions, from prepress to press and postpress. We have the most extensive product portfolio in the field of sheetfed offset, and it is carefully geared toward generating customer benefits," continues Plenz.
