Evolving into the future
Leigh Hopkins, Schaeffler’s UK Country Sales Director Industrial takes a look back at a challenging 2022 that saw growth despite challenging macroeconomic conditions. Though there are still reasons to be optimistic in 2023: Schaeffler has made some smart acquisitions over the last 18 months, which have extended the Industrial Division’s product portfolio and technical expertise.
2022 was a challenging year for the UK as a whole. COVID coming into endemic levels, global turmoil, through to high energy costs. These have impacted all businesses, including Schaeffler UK. As well as tough macroeconomic conditions, on occasions we also experienced supply chain issues, which lengthened lead times. However, despite these factors, Schaeffler UK’s Industrial division had a pretty robust 2022.
Focus on food
Looking forward into 2023, the Food & Beverage sector is now a key focus for us. The sector remained very robust during the COVID-19 lockdowns and seems almost recession-proof. Food demand is increasing and companies are looking for alternative ways of sourcing and producing food. I’m sure there will be growth in certain key areas of the food industry, as companies struggle to obtain ingredients from their usual sources. The demand for food will never go away. So to meet this demand food producers need even more efficient machinery with higher availability, supplemented by maintenance tools such as condition monitoring to help prolong the life of these machines. They want to get more out of their processes, higher reliability, more predictability, as well as highly efficient production runs.
We are therefore working hard to strengthen our product portfolio for the food sector, including new food-sensitive greases and housed bearing units that are suitable for washdown environments. We focus on the whole of the production process, from the precision components that go into the machine, through its operation and maintenance – the complete lifecycle. Our Lifetime Solutions portfolio includes the OPTIME wireless condition monitoring solution, which is particularly suitable for the food industry. With OPTIME, sensors measure the status of a piece of equipment while it is in operation. Remote data capture can establish trends, predict failure, assess degradation and calculate remaining life, enabling real time analysis. Schaeffler’s OPTIME C1 has also been developed to provide targeted maintenance of relubrication systems and to eliminate the need for manual, route-based checks.
Sector-dedicated expertise
The MRO business is extensive in the UK and therefore a driver for Schaeffler. To ensure that we are adaptable to this market, we are looking to foster closer relationships with end users, but it’s also about our distribution partners. How we get our messages across to both parties about the value of Schaeffler’s products and services is important. This means finding out the precise needs of the end users. Internally, we have sector-dedicated engineers who deal with a small number of specific sectors to provide expertise to the end customer and provide a more tailored experience.
We want to get our specific messages across to the end customer in terms of our availability, technical solutions and expertise, product reliability, condition monitoring enhancements, and our complete lifetime solutions portfolio, following our Group ethos to look at the whole circular economy. This also includes the reconditioning of existing bearings, where we can encourage customers to reuse bearings that may be OK but just need a little love and attention to put them back into optimum condition for the application. Reconditioned bearings means shorter lead times, less CO2, reduced waste and ultimately more sustainable. Moving from a linear to a more circular economy means we need to do more of this, recycle and reuse more.
Sustainable energy sources
Globally, Schaeffler is introducing more sustainable energy sources for its own production sites. For example, Schaeffler will purchase electricity from wind turbines from Statkraft Markets GmbH, which will cover around 8% of Schaeffler’s electricity needs in Germany, as well as acquiring a solar farm in Kammerstein, Germany, supporting the target for 25% of the company’s global energy requirements coming from self-generation by 2030.
Green hydrogen is another area where Schaeffler is making big strides. French hydrogen producer Lhyfe will build and operate an electrolysis plant with a capacity up to 15 MW at Schaeffler’s site in Herzogenaurach, Germany. Part of the agreement is a technology partnership to promote the use of Schaeffler’s electrolysis stacks. It’s also a good example of how Schaeffler’s expertise in the manufacture of high precision components can be transferred to a leading edge sustainable energy development.
A little closer to home, our Sheffield plant has made significant changes to the waste stream as part of an initiative that seeks to send no waste to landfill. As part of the programme, general waste created at the plant is being processed locally and used for heat recovery that benefits the local community, including hospitals. In 2022, the plant achieved 100% zero-waste-to-landfill, but is continuing to work on this and improving the whole sustainable economy, looking at how to make not only our production but also the lifespan of our products more sustainable.
Smart acquisitions
Over the past 18 months, Schaeffler has also been very active acquiring companies that will improve and extend its Industrial division’s product portfolio and expertise. These acquisitions will help to strengthen our position in industrial markets at a time where everything is changing we are doing our best to evolve.
Precision planetary gearbox supplier, Melior Motion, for example, was acquired by Schaeffler in 2022. Now known as Schaeffler Ultra Precision Drives, the business is well equipped to target the industrial automation and robotics markets.
Another exciting acquisition took place in 2022. Ceraspin, a manufacturer of premium ceramic products such as ceramic rolling elements for various bearing applications including electric motors, hybrid power, wind energy, medical equipment and vacuum pumps for the semiconductor industry. Ceraspin is a valuable addition to the Industrial Division’s capabilities at Schaeffler, while also securing and strengthening the supply chain.
And last but not least, the acquisition of Ewellix Group is a very interesting one, it shows the ambition that Schaeffler has in terms of the linear motion field which nicely links into our current focus on the food and beverage sector.
2023 will be a challenging year, with growth levels currently forecast as contraction. Currently we seem to be stuck in a ‘poly-crisis’, with international conflict, global recession and higher energy costs. However, where there are challenges to overcome, there are always opportunities. Innovation, for example, normally occurs when a challenge needs to be solved. Schaeffler is very well placed to take advantage by harnessing its own innovative engineering culture and continuing to develop technologies that make a real difference to our lives.