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[August 2000]
dmc2 - extensive expansion at Hanau-Wolfgang
dmc2 Degussa Metals Catalysts Cerdec AG has announced it will significantly increase production floor space at the Hanau-Wolfgang (Germany) facility by mid-2001. More than 7,500m2 will be added on. The group is a leading producer of advanced components for high tech applications for IT and telecommunications, electronics and sensors as well as for the pharmaceutical and chemical sectors and for environmental technology. With some 5,300 employees world-wide, the company has a turnover of Euro 700 million. Overall turnover, including precious metals, runs to about Euro 4 billion.
CEO Ernst Gumrich stated that rapidly increasing demand for its products made it necessary to invest in new construction and rebuilding work. He added: "dmc2 is growth orientated. Sales will increase about 18% in 2000. In the following years, we also plan to grow by an average of 14% in all sectors. Commensurate with sales, we are also experiencing a significant increase in profits. After having raised profits in the last business year by 12%, growth in the first half of 2000 topped 14%.
"We cannot handle such increases with our existing production capacities. Our high-tech applications are growing at breathtaking speed. Construction is therefore planned at the Hanau-Wolfgang site, scheduled to be complete by mid-2001. This will allow us to catch up with our growth rates in production."
Development and production facilities for fuel cells will be expanded the most. The company is one of two producers world-wide developing and producing all important components for the energy source for the future. As dmc2 expects demand for space, especially for fuel cells, to increase rapidly, erection of an additional production area designed for particularly high standards required by such high tech materials becomes necessary, in addition to taking more space within existing buildings. The 750m2 presently occupied by the fuel cell unit will be extended to a total of 6,000m2.
The electronic division within the Technical Materials business unit is currently experiencing similar growth rates. Thus, the existing production area will be tripled and will cover 3,500m2 in future. As an example of the growth in demand, so-called Ball-Grid-Arrays are used in mobile phones, video recorders and computers to link chips with PC boards. Up to February 2000, dmc2 produced about one billion of these BGAs per year. Using a considerably abridged production process, the company has been supplying about one billion units per month to the electronics industry since May - and the trend is steeply upwards.
In the context of this recently announced building work, the brazing equipment division will move to larger production facilities existing on the Hanau-Wolfgang site.
ENDS