Filling and packaging systems manufacturer The KHS Group was this week named “one of the most innovative companies in Germany”.
The 2015 German SME Summit acknowledged the successful innovation management of KHS with a Top 100 Award.
Prof. Dr.-Ing. Matthias Niemeyer, CEO of KHS, said he was pleased the company was recognised in this way.
“It's very important to create a climate within the company which encourages innovation,” he said.
“Certain groups of employees, for instance, are able to use 10 per cent of their work time to develop their own ideas. Inventor compensation and premiums act as additional incentives and are intended to encourage personnel to submit suggestions for improvements and innovations.”
The international Engineer4Future trainee program also gives KHS employees schooling on products and projects, and provides expertise designed to encourage corporate thought and action.
KHS has had success with such innovations as lightweighting, which has resulted in the design of pioneering beverage packaging. Extremely lightweight PET bottles yield benefits for both beverage producers and consumers. Another future-proof KHS innovation is its Nature MultiPack packaging system, which has won the National German Sustainability Award. It takes away the need for film materials for beverage packs, enabling resources to be conserved and the amount of waste produced by consumers to be reduced.
The company has also launched a KHS Everywhere app, which gives customers the option of retrieving information on the status of their filling and packaging lines or single machines.
The company recently announced sales increases of 5.8 per cent, with annual turnover of €1.08 billion (AU$1.58 billion) on the back of expanding its service business.
Niemeyer said business was especially strong in Europe, with the company generating 35.3 per cent of sales on its home continent in the last year.
The Middle East and Africa formed a 15.7 per cent share of total sales; the Asia Pacific accounted for 23.8 per cent; and the US and Latin America – 25.2 per cent.
The company recently established its new KHS World Logistics Centre, with its larger stock in Dortmund, Germany. KHS customers can now access more spare parts, faster logistics and shorter delivery times. Warehousing capacities have also been increased at locations such as Shanghai to optimise the international supply of spare parts.
KHS is currently moving forward with its Bottles & Shapes program – a holistic service for the development of bottle designs aimed at increasing product quality and economy when bottling beverages. The company grew its blow mould production by 25 per cent last year, compared to 2013. Other established systems such as the Innofill Can DVD can filler with an output of 132,000 cans per hour have contributed to the company's consistent growth.
