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Profile of the branch
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A large range of products, process stability, product quality and last but not least the speed of product development of our customers make highest demands on us. To meet these demands, the branch no longer plays a decisive role as a hardware-supplier. Therefore, the tool shop more and more assists its customers at their product development. By means of production-geared construction, not only errors in the production can be avoided, but, also the production costs can be reduced. The structures of the toolshop branch are typically medium-sized. Among 5000 companies in the German sector nearly 80 % employ less than 20 employees. Only about 50 companies employ more than 100 employees. The whole branch achieves an annual turnover of 5,5 billion Euros, thereof approximately 1,2 billion Euros in foreign countries. With 1 billion Euros the imports are a lot smaller. The most important foreign customers are Czechia, Switzerland, Great Britain and the United States with an export volume about significantly more than 100 million Euros p.a., followed by Austria, France and Italy (each with about 60-70 million Euros p.a.).
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In the industrial production the tool shop has a key position: tools have a decisive impact on process stability and process speed - and also on the quality of the manufactured products as well as the production costs. Only high-quality tools meet the extraordinary demands and qualify to produce the desired number of products without quality defects. Nearly all tools are unique copies. As special solutions they are manufactured in single-part production. They provide a basis to produce large numbers of products of any kind. The idea to produce hundreds and thousands of different products with only one tool immediately reveals the key role of tools in industrial production. The tool shop is central for production know-how. Tools significantly determine the structures of production operations, in other words type, number, order and speed of production steps. Tools are utilized for primary forming as well as for forming. For primary forming of metal-materials e.g. die-casting molds are used, for polymers injection die molding tools are applied. For forming blacksmith’s swages, compression molding or punching tools are considered. All these tools have in common, that their geometry partly or even completely forms the shape of the components, determining the shape of the product. Another field in tool shop is the production of devices. These are connected to components and function as positioning, fixing or clamping as well as the guidance of tools.
The tool shop branch is extremely labor-intensive. The branch employs more highly-skilled engineers, technicians and skilled trade workers than most of the other industrial fields.
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