Arburg expands management team and opens Romanian subsidiary

Arburg, headquartered in Lossburg, Germany, has announced the appointment of Tobias Baur to the position of Managing Director Sales and After Sales, as well as the expansion of its presence in south-eastern Europe with the establishment of a new Romanian subsidiary.

Tobias Baur will take over the leadership of the Sales and After Sales division from September 1, succeeding Gerhard Böhm upon the latter’s retirement. Baur spent many years working for the Trumpf Group in Ditzingen, most recently as Director Global Sales and Marketing at the Trumpf Werkzeugmaschinen SE + Co. KG division. Among other things, he was previously in charge of product management and international sales of the services business. As General Manager from 2014-2019, he was charged with setting up the Trumpf Additive Manufacturing division in Ditzingen and Schio, Italy.

The Arburg management team

With the arrival of the new Managing Director, the Arburg management team will consist of Managing Partners Michael Hehl (Premises Development and spokesperson for the management) and Juliane Hehl (Global Marketing and Business Development), as well as Managing Directors Tobias Baur (Sales, After Sales), Guido Frohnhaus (Technology & Engineering) and Steffen Kroner (Finance, Controlling, IT, Human Resource Management).

Eastern Europe expansion

The new Romanian subsidiary is based in Bucharest and is headed up by Interim Managing Director Dr Daniel Orel, who is also responsible for the Arburg subsidiaries in Czechia and Slovakia.

With the new subsidiary in Romania, Arburg now has its own organisations at thirty-seven locations in twenty-seven countries as well as trading partners in over 100 countries. This is how the company works to enable all of its technology as well the necessary specialists to be on site quickly when needed by customers.

“We want to make our portfolio of products and services available to customers in this growing market easily, quickly and reliably,” explained Dr Daniel Orel. “Since our previous trading partner decided to close their business rather than pass it on, this was a logical step given how important continuity of support for our Romanian and international customers in the market was to us.”

Customers in Romania had been supported by an Arburg trading partner since 2000, most of whose service technicians were able to be absorbed into the new subsidiary. This means that eleven employees have been working in Bucharest from the outset, all of whom have experience as Arburg service technicians and are already known to the customers.

Important location for South Eastern Europe

“We have always had our own organisations in places where our customers are located and make investments,” added Steffen Eppler, Vice President Sales Europe at Arburg. “Romania is very important for Arburg. Increasingly, companies are also installing very sophisticated systems there. The infrastructure in the country has improved significantly in the last twenty years. Now as before, entire productions are still being moved to Romania. This is another reason why we want to offer our existing customers comprehensive advice and services on site and thus also win new customers.”

Since Romania is a big country in terms of area, the company aims to continue to work with a decentralised service organisation in order to be able to reach customers quickly.

Increasingly sophisticated technology

Romania is also in the process of increasing technological advancement. It was formerly mainly a market with hydraulic machines; now, there are more electric machines and the proportion of robotic systems and automation is growing too. The majority of the plastics processing companies produce components for the automotive industry. Other industries in Romania include electronics, building technology and construction, packaging and household goods.

Since its accession into the EU, a lot of money has been invested in the country, leading to a huge improvement in the infrastructure. Most of Arburg’s customers have established themselves in Transylvania, in the north west of the Carpathian region. While the majority of customers before the country joined the EU were Romanian, today they are mostly large to medium-sized German and international companies.

“They are all familiar with our product and service portfolio and trust Arburg as a partner for practical, individual processing solutions,” said Dr Daniel Orel. “With the establishment of our own subsidiary in Bucharest, we want to strengthen existing partnerships and establish new contacts to further expand Arburg’s market position in Romania.”

www.arburg.com