Bosch Rexroth held up well in 2019 in a difficult environment and despite a sharp drop in incoming orders. At 6.2 billion euros, sales remained stable at the previous year’s record level. The company benefited from a solid core business in hydraulics and the further expansion of its product range in factory automation as an important door opener for new markets.
“We draw a positive conclusion for 2019," says Rolf Najork, member of the Board of Management of Robert Bosch GmbH, responsible for the Industrial Technology division and Chairman of the board of Bosch Rexroth AG. "In view of the volatile markets and the noticeable economic slowdown, this very good result was anything but certain. It shows that our broad positioning with different divisions is a great advantage and that we have set the right course with our structural adjustments.”
In 2019, Bosch Rexroth was able to match the success of the previous year in all regions. The core markets of Germany and Europe remained the strongest. Sales in Germany dropped by 4.1 percent to 1.4 billion euros. In the remaining European markets (excluding Germany), sales declined by 0.3 percent to 2.1 billion euros compared to the previous year. In the growth markets in the Asia-Pacific / Africa region, Bosch Rexroth achieved sales of 1.6 billion euros, which equals a slight increase of 0.6 percent. The region North and South America recorded a 5.3 percent rise to 1.1 billion euros. At the end of the fiscal year (December 31, 2019), the company employed around 31,000 people worldwide.
Economic environment and COVID-19 pandemic cloud prospects for 2020
Bosch Rexroth expects business to decline in all regions and sectors in the current fiscal year 2020 due to the general economic weakness and the structural change in customer sectors closely linked to the automotive industry. Order intake declined by 20.3 percent in the course of 2019.
Additionally, the global COVID-19 pandemic is currently clouding business expectations for 2020. Hence, the systematic implementation of measures to improve competitiveness in all areas is particularly important for Bosch Rexroth.
"We are very much concerned with the current developments regarding COVID-19. We have taken extensive measures during the past weeks to protect our employees, customers and partners while ensuring the best possible supply," says Najork, "Safety is our top priority throughout. We want to be a reliable and responsible partner for our customers, also and especially in such global crises".
Focus on innovations and new markets
Bosch Rexroth remains one of the most significant innovation drivers and pioneer for new technologies in its markets. For example, the company invested some 348 million euros in research and development in fiscal year 2019 – an increase of 6.2 percent over the previous year. The company continues to focus on developing connected and fully automated solutions in the two major areas of hydraulics and factory automation.
All divisions contributed to the success of Bosch Rexroth in 2019. While the core business with industrial and mobile hydraulics proved to be a solid foundation, the factory automation division with its focus on Industry 4.0 and the vision of the fully connected factory of the future, developed into an important door opener for new markets and customers.
Machinery Applications and Engineering: connected and intelligent hydraulics
Bosch Rexroth is actively driving change in its traditional core business of industrial hydraulics: smart hydraulic components and systems such as the compact hydraulic unit CytroBox can be quickly and easily integrated into connected manufacturing facilities. They are Industry 4.0 ready and offer services for the Internet of Things (IoT), for example for condition monitoring of machines and plants.
Mobile Hydraulics: Smart Solutions for the mobile work machine of the future
Despite the tense market environment, Bosch Rexroth was able to further expand its market share in mobile hydraulics in 2019. New activities in the fields of automation and driver assistance systems, electrification and IoT are future key topics.
With BODAS Connect, Bosch Rexroth offers an open, scalable end-to-end solution to connect mobile work machines with each other. It enables customers to retrieve and analyze data from the mobile application. At the 2019 BAUMA trade fair for construction machinery, the company also presented the first components of a future range of electrification systems for work machines. These solutions support customers in reducing emissions, while further increasing performance. Here, Bosch Rexroth benefits from the long-standing Bosch expertise in electromobility.
Factory Automation: new standards for connected manufacturing
Connected assembly and intralogistics remain an important strategic focus for Bosch Rexroth’s factory automation division. The spotlight is on the vision of the factory of the future with software-based, automated and connected solutions. The company was able to further strengthen its position as an innovation driver in 2019, amongst others with the open ctrlX AUTOMATION platform.
As the first 5G-capable automation platform from Bosch Rexroth, ctrlX AUTOMATION connects a wide range of devices with the new communication standard and ensures consistent connectivity in factories. Existing machines can be upgraded with the new technology via retrofit solutions. The Active Shuttle, which was also introduced in 2019, ensures greater flexibility and higher productivity in the automated factory. The autonomous transport system sets new standards in intralogistics, transports loads of up to 260 kilograms and is loaded and unloaded fully automatically using an integrated lifting platform.
"GoGreen" project: targets for energy and CO₂ savings exceeded
In 2019, Bosch Rexroth was also able to record important achievements in CO2 neutrality: as part of the Bosch Group, the supplier of drive and control technologies has set itself ambitious goals to reduce energy consumption and CO₂ emissions. In the scope of the Bosch Rexroth project “GoGreen”, energy efficiency is being systematically improved in all plants and at customers' sites since 2011 – with an extremely positive outcome: by the end of fiscal 2019, Bosch Rexroth had saved 620 million kilowatt hours of electricity and gas worldwide thanks to "GoGreen," corresponding to more than 265,000 tons of CO₂. This equals the annual energy consumption of a city with some 80,000 inhabitants. Energy consumption at the Bosch Rexroth locations was reduced by 20 to 50 percent. Since the end of 2019, Bosch Rexroth has achieved a CO2-neutral “footprint” in Germany.
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