Dienes werke - at the cutting edge

9 October 2006




“We have enjoyed very strong growth for the past 13 years,” Bernd Supe-Dienes, managing partner of leading industrial cutting technology specialist Dienes Werke, told Converting Today. “Our strategy to become a global provider to both OEMs and users has come a long way, although there are still a couple of places we are working on. We have a very high level of sales from all over the world.

“We are not the cheap guy - we only deal in quality products. The line between high quality and low quality is always moving, so we have to work hard to keep our prices as low as possible in competition with cheaper suppliers. Our strength is that, for film and non wovens, especially difficult laminates, we offer cutting solutions and high productivity, with service life optimized. We supply many different industries, from thin film to steel coil. Customers come to us with problems. We come up with new ideas and solutions to help them keep up with changes.”

He said the converting market in the industrialized nations is in a consolidation phase. “There is no growth at the moment. A lot of capacity has moved east, to Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary. This is bringing big structural changes to the market. Our office in Poland has almost doubled its sales every year since we set it up six years ago. Since 1993, we have complemented our German manufacturing base with a plant in Hungary.

Eastern promise

“We are a batch producer, not large volumes,” he continued. “We don't compete with the big commodity manufacturers, such as in China. In five or 10 years time we will have to manufacture there, or somewhere in the East - possibly Malaysia. That would make us as competitive for knives as we already are for holders and systems. Then we will be able to compete in the Asian region, but we are not ready yet.”

Dienes has had a facility in the USA for 30 years. It sources products from the German and Hungarian plants, and makes holders and systems for the US market to their standards. It also supplies Mexico and Canada.

“Business is stable there but, due to the US economic situation at present, it's not growing,” Bernd Supe-Dienes noted. “It is a $10M business for us, and once the investment comes back, we will develop from there. We are not strong yet in South America, but we are working on that. Brazil has huge market potential. We have presence there, but we still need to set up a network for distribution. We have the contacts, but it will take a couple of years to achieve our target.”

What are the company's latest innovations? “Cutting top to top, two top knives against each other, especially for paper sheeters,” he states. “Up to eight layers can be cut from both sides, which gives a better quality of cut. This method (see picture) gives a very accurate side pressure, with very stable cutting parameters. The knives are driven by an electric motor, which helps to keep dust to a minimum.”

Another particularly interesting development is the Golden Slit knife for narrow width applications. “A spring action is built into the knife to eliminate many of the parts and tolerances of conventional narrow width systems,” he explained. “There is also no need for collars. We develop a software program in-house for each application. First we simulate the knife performance, and then we use the results to develop the software.

“A big part of the market has yet to realize the potential for the Golden Slit. We can demonstrate the concept to customers and we have partner customers who will help us test developments. Golden Slit saves costs as well as being more precise. While the initial knife cost is higher, the system will actually provide substantial overall savings in the long term.”

Dienes is known especially for its expertise in knifeholder systems. “We estimate our share of the OEM market worldwide at around 40 per cent - and 10-15 per cent worldwide overall,” he affirms. “Our quality is our strength, we don't try to compete with the cheaper quality suppliers. Our latest systems have built-in remote analysis via the internet, so we can quickly recommend suitable solutions to each user.”

Bigger

He sees the UK market as a special case. “We still want to get a bigger share there, of both OEMs and converters. It's a challenge for us due to the structure of that market: we've seen a tremendous structural change in the UK market in the past 25 years. Service is very strong there. The rest of Europe still has to catch up on what's been done there - across the whole industry, not just in knives.”

Summarizing his views on the industry generally, Bernd Supe-Dienes concluded: “Speeds of process machines are increasing all the time. This brings technological challenges and it requires tremendous effort to keep up with the developments. Our strength is that we can give customers the right knife and system for whatever they need. OEMs can't do this. We have a tremendous base of knifeholders that we have developed for different applications over the years, and we are able to use this as a resource for new applications. We are now starting to compete with standard holders as well; before, we only concentrated on specials to meet different applications.”



Contact

Dienes
Tel: +49 2206 605 210





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