The complete history of the development of The - The Linde Group

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In 1980, at Meinhardt’s request, the then CEO of Allianz,
Wolfgang Schieren, joined Linde’s Supervisory Board and soon
thereafter became its chairman, acting as a guarantor of stability
and continuity.
Linde in the United States
1996
Linde Gas LLC is mainly represented in the eastern United States and Puerto
Rico. Approx 160 tanker trucks are on the highway.
The total number of people infected with the
AIDS virus is estimated to be 22.6 million.
N o 5124 Storage receptacle
for cryogenic media (tank for liquid hydrogen).
In 1990s, Linde stepped up its involvement in North America.
Although the company had already been represented there
during the early years, it had not only lost its subsidiaries after
the two world wars but even the rights to the Linde name in
the US. The reference plants built after WWII did not immediately
lead to the hoped-for breakthrough on the US market. In the
industrial truck market, however, the entry in to the US market
through a subsidiary was finally successful with the takeover
of the Baker Material Handling Corporation in 1977.
Linde was successful in 1996 with the strategically important
purchase of the Pro-Quip Corporation (TPQ) in Tulsa, Oklahoma,
which is, among other things, the world market leader
in small hydrogen plants. After this acquisition, Tulsa was built
up to become a new “Linde center” in the US. In 1999, Linde
moved the subsidiary Lotepro Inc. from New York to Oklahoma
and, at the end of 2001, merged Lotepro Inc. and the Pro-Quip
Corp. into Linde Process Plants Inc. In 2002, the British gas company
BOC acquired a 30 percent investment in this company,
after which it was known as Linde BOC Process Plants LLC.
In the US, Linde also expanded in the area of technical gases
with the takeover of the Sunox Inc. gas company in Charlotte
through subsidiary Holox Inc. And Linde successfully entered the
American hydrogen and carbon monoxide business through a
cooperative agreement with Millenium Petrochemicals Inc.
But symbolically the most important date for Linde in the
US was certainly January 1, 1999: As of this date, the North
American group companies were once again permitted to use
the name “Linde.” Forty-four years after the end of the war,
Linde once again owns the rights to the “Linde” name and
trademark in the United States.
From Dr. Hans Meinhardt to Gerhard Full to
Dr. Wolfgang Reitzle
During the shareholders’ meeting in May 1997, Hans Meinhardt
stepped down from his post as President and CEO of Linde AG
after 21 years, taking instead the office of chairman of the
Supervisory Board, which he held until spring 2003.
Under Meinhardt’s leadership, Linde received new structures
and new fields of business and transformed itself from a
technology-loving engineering company with strong ties to its
founding family to a global, manager-led technology company.
Linde’s sales during the “Meinhardt era” rose by a factor of
25. And profits after taxes grew by a factor of 33, from 7.2 million
to 240 million euro. Over the same period, the number of
employees rose from 13,500 in 1970 to more than 46,500 in
2002.
In 1997, Gerhard Full became President and CEO. He had
worked for the company since 1962 and was first in charge of
facilities engineering on the Executive Board (see also page 82).