PDF [2.4 MB] - Kolbenschmidt Pierburg AG

Newsline
Between 29 September and 3 October 2000, 15 journalists from renowned European newspapers and magazines
traveled to the USA to collect first-hand information on the activities of the Kolbenschmidt Pierburg group in North
America. The tight schedule included visits with Pierburg Inc. in Fountain Inn/Greenville (South Carolina) and Karl
Schmidt Unisia Inc. in Marinette (Wisconsin). One of the group of journalists was Christian Bartsch (72) who worked for
the German newspapers Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Süddeutsche Zeitung and the Swiss Automobile Revue.
Bartsch (born in Klein-Polkwitz, Lower Silesia) who has written about his impressions of Kolbenschmidt Pierburg’s activities
in the USA, is rated as an expert in this field: after school and an apprenticeship as a car mechanic, he went on
to study mechanical engineering in Dresden and Berlin; after his university studies, he developed two-stroke engines
for four years and then worked in the industrial control and measurement sector for some years. In 1961, he moved on
to work as a technical journalist for the paper Motor Rundschau (Frankfurt am Main); Bartsch
has been working as a free-lance journalist, author and consultant to renowned German
companies – primarily in the automotive sector – since 1970. Summing up his personal impressions
of the trip, Bartsch stated: “During our short trip through the USA, we journalists
got to know the “other side” of Kolbenschmidt Pierburg that will help to secure the group’s
future. The group is in the process of conquering the New World, at least its automotive sector.
And we learned about future developments to be tackled by Kolbenschmidt Pierburg.
There is certainly plenty of work on the road ahead!”
Kolbenschmidt Pierburg: great success with German technology
A circumspect approach to the USA
Greenville/Marinette. When Europeans
refer to the USA, they may mean
Florida, New York or perhaps Hollywood
and Los Angeles. We know about
the last war in the States, the war
between the north and south and obviously
about the Indians from films
and literature. But what about Kolbenschmidt
Pierburg? What have they got
to do with the USA? In point of fact,
quite a lot – and a lot more in future,
too. The following article gives some
impressions gained during a short trip
through the United States.
“What you see there are all potential
customers”, said Dr. Dieter Seipler
with broad smile. What he actually
meant were the large American limousines,
pick-ups and SUVs (special utility
vehicles) on a crowded street. Some
of them already have pistons from Kolbenschmidt,
originating from the joint
production program with Unisia JECS,
a Japanese piston manufacturer. Other
vehicles may be equipped with Pier-
burg parts, “but still not enough” in
the opinion of Seipler, who points out
that this will certainly change in the
years to come; after all, the company
only entered the US market with its
own production in 1996. Given this
short period of time, the company has
achieved a lot.
In 1995, the executive board of Pierburg
AG decided to establish a production
plant in Greenville, South Carolina,
in the south east of the USA.
There were many reasons for choosing
this site, particularly the vicinity of
BMW in the neighboring town of Spartanburg,
DaimlerChrysler in Alabama
and especially VW in Mexico. The infrastructure
in the region is excellent; a
further bonus has been that the state
of Carolina helped with tax incentives
and with the training of the initial
workforce. As explained by Willy Ruefenacht,
president of Pierburg Inc.,
“we had to teach the employees the
metric system.” Although the system
Production started in late summer 1996: the Pierburg Inc. plant at Fountain Inn.
14
Rosa Lee, a Pierburg Inc. employee in
Greenville (South Carolina) since 1998
at the functional test stand of line 3
where fuel tank modules are being
tested for DaimlerChrysler.
has existed in the USA for more than
three decades, it has never really been
used. Distances are still measured in
miles, as evident everywhere on the
signposts and even on the speedometers
in cars. And inches are still a common
unit as are many other older units
of measurement.
The first gasoline modules left the
new factory in Greenville on the first of
August 1996, and by the end of the
year the company had generated sales
worth two million dollars. Today, sales
are in the order of 30 million dollars,
and the trend is up. Initially, only four
products were manufactured; today,
(Continued on page 15)