Linde Hydraulics opens new main plant in Aschaffenburg

14 September, 2016

The plant consists of a 22,000 sq. m large production and assembly hall and an extendable office complex. This provides a new, state-of-the-art workplace for the 700 employees at Linde Hydraulics: 400 production and assembly employees and 300 employees in R&D, sales, quality control, order management and purchasing.

This 80 million euro investment represents one of the largest factory investments in rural Bavaria in the last 10 years. Financing for the purchase of the land, construction and investment in new, modern plant was provided by a property company, which is funded in turn by Weichai Power, the majority stakeholder in Linde Hydraulics.

After Linde Hydraulics became legally independent in 2012, the company has now achieved its own physical independence. The inaugural ceremony was held in the presence of Guo Shuqing, governor from Shandong province, Klaus Herzog, the Lord Mayor of the City of Aschaffenburg, Tan Xuguang, chairman and CEO of Weichai Power and Gordon Riske, chairman of the executive board of Kion Group AG.

"With this new, state-of-the-art building, Linde Hydraulics has created an excellent basis for further independent development and more competitiveness," said Dr Jörg Ulrich, CEO of Linde Hydraulics during the ceremony, adding that the company will be able to use growth potential and innovative opportunities more rapidly and more effectively in future.

Tan Xuguang added: "This investment in the new, enlarged plant in Aschaffenburg is a clear signal of our confidence in the innovative power and the long-term growth potential of Linde Hydraulics' main location. We will also provide incentives for successful expansion into Asian markets from here in future."

In his speech, the Lord Mayor called the construction project a "milestone for industrial development in the Aschaffenburg region". Aschaffenburg has a long tradition as an industrial centre with many highly-skilled jobs and the city administration is a reliable partner of business and industry, he said.

State-of-the art energy management and effective energy recovery

In proceeding with the construction project, Linde Hydraulics is underlining its commitment to environmental awareness. The new buildings have been equipped with the latest energy-efficient building technology which accurately records and quickly analyses energy consumption in real time. This technology seamlessly coordinates energy savings and recovery, for example by using heat exchangers to feed the heat given off by machinery into the system.

Linde has also invested in new, high-use energy-saving machinery and the new plant is already ISO 50001 certified. In constructing a completely new plant and buildings, Linde Hydraulics has taken the opportunity to optimise work processes and information flows.

"We place particular importance on energy efficient products, such as our hydraulic star-stop system. In commissioning this project, we have not only optimised the structure of our plant in order to achieve considerably better interdisciplinary cooperation, we have also further optimised the plant itself," said Dr Steffen Appel, member of the company management and responsible for the project. "I would like to thank all parties involved in the project who completed it not only on time but also within budget."

The plant has capacity for 150,000 hydraulic units (pumps and motors) and an additional 50,000 assembly kits for final assembly in other plants. The project was completed on a newly-purchased property near the old plant over the past two and a half years. The adjacent parking building with over 770 parking spaces was commissioned as recently as September 2014. The project was completed within the specified timeframe and on budget. Construction was carried out by local construction firms and coordinated by an architectural firm in Aschaffenburg.