Buhler Group: Increasing market share

The consolidated sales of the Buhler Group (www.buhlergroup.com) amounted to CHF 1338 million, which is 0.9 percent lower than a year before. This decline was due on the one hand to a number of external burdens (high grain prices, Iraq war, SARS, dollar weakness), and on the other hand to the sale of the Material Conveying business unit including the English company Redler Ltd. In the previous year’s figures, this unit accounted for sales of CHF 50.2 million. Order bookings totaled CHF 1395.3 million, which is 0.5 percent below the level of a year ago (CHF 1402.3 million), but adjusted for ex-change rates 1.3 percent above it. A very encouraging sign is the 12 percent rise in the backlog of orders by the end of the reporting year, to CHF 641.7 million. In consolidating markets, these figures could only be achieved by increasing market share.

Buhler is the worldwide successful partner for engineering and building complete plants, systems and machines for thermal treatment of polymers. The business unit Thermal Processes supplies customer-oriented continuous-operation systems for heating, cooling, crystallization, drying and solid-state polycondensation (SSP).

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These systems are used for both mass-type and special polymers, as well as for recycled polymers. All systems can be operated with either flakes, pellets or powder. Moreover, the company supplies systems for upgrading the post-consumer PET bottle flakes to PET bottle pellets that are suitable for direct food-contact applications. Besides the engineering of new plants and systems, Buhler also offers services such as debottlenecking of existing systems, lab and pilot plant testing, plant design and joint process development.

Bühler AG, Uzwil, Switzerland