KraussMaffei concentrates extrusion technologies under a single roof

As what is part of the largest investment programmes in KraussMaffei’s history, KraussMaffei Group is building a completely new plant plus a modern extrusion R&D centre in Laatzen, on the outskirts of Hannover, where it is merging all corporate extrusion operations at a single location.

“Bundling the extrusion activities at one location is the right strategic response to current and future challenges in our industry,” said Volker Nilles, the Executive Vice President for New Machinery Business at KraussMaffei. Over the past 20 years, KraussMaffei Group has grown a portfolio comprised of nearly all extrusion technologies: from pipes and profiles to sheet and flat film, rubber and foam extrusion and even compounding and recycling.  Now, all these different technologies will be brought together at a single location.

In strategic terms, this approach will yield substantial product benefits for customers, valuable synergy effects for the company and new opportunities and fields of research for the future.

For several years now, the company has already been exploring new developments, such as direct processing solutions- solutions that require fewer process steps and less energy, thus decreasing the thermal stress to which the material is subjected. The new R&D centre will provide opportunity to implement and test other, completely new ideas as well, said Nilles.

Companies will be able to produce their own materials, even based on e.g. reclaimed materials, and test drive new processes and technologies.

At the R&D centre, experts in extrusion as well as in digitalisation and Industry 4.0 will be available for support and advice and to oversee trials. “Customers will get a live experience of all the technologies available at KraussMaffei…This saves time and substantially simplifies coordination,” said Nilles.

The company has also implemented a new sales structure based on closer cooperation between technical experts and regional sales, he added, designed to boost its customer support capacities. In addition, new staff will be added to the Pipe & Profile expert team

“We are firmly convinced that we are well prepared for future challenges in the extrusion industry, no matter what the application,” Nilles concluded.

The relocation of the entire extrusion division is scheduled for the second half of 2022. The new facility will span 10,000 square meters and be equipped with 26 production scale - in other words, over the full length including downstream equipment, e.g. cooling section, take-off system, winder and separating system - extrusion lines, specifically for customer trials.