SEW Eurodrive


SEW-EURODRIVE GmbH & Co KG is a German company which is a leading manufacturer of drive technology. It is owned by the Blickle family.
Since its founding in 1931, the company has been headquartered in Bruchsal, Germany.
SEW EURODRIVE produces gear units, motors, gearmotors and inverter technology in various sizes for diverse industries and applications. Not only does the company produce compact drives in the motor power range from 0.09 kW to 225 kW but also powerful industrial gear units with input torques of up to several million Nm. Within the context of Industry 4.0, SEWEURODRIVE offers solutions for the Lean Smart Factory, including mobile assembly and logistics assistants and digital factory planning.

History and background

SEW-EURODRIVE has applied for a large number of patents since it was founded almost 90 years ago. The company, managed by the third generation of the Blickle family, focuses on becoming a smart company, combining the concepts of Industry 4.0 with the principles of Lean management. With versatile and adaptable factories, SEW-EURODRIVE aims for more customized solutions.
In SEW-EURODRIVE's showcase factory at its production and logistics plant in Graben-Neudorf, which has been operated since 2016, mobile logistics assistants and networked production islands open up new possibilities regarding production processes.

The beginnings under Ernst Blickle

It all started with the designer Albert Obermoser. His geared motor, designed in 1928, revolutionized drive technology. Christian Pähr, a trained banker, recognized the enormous potential of that drive design and acquired the rights to the geared motor from the bankrupt estate of Obermoser AG. Despite economic and political turmoil, he took a bold step and founded the company "Süddeutsche-Elektromotoren-Werke" in 1931, known since 1971 as SEW-EURODRIVE. Just a few years later in 1935, when Christian Pähr died, his wife Kunigunde Pähr took over the company with the support of their daughter Edeltraut Pähr. In 1945, Ernst Wilhelm Blickle, Christian Pähr’s son-in-law, took over as managing director of the company.
Until 1945, when the Allied Strategic Command bombed Bruchsal into rubble, SEW produced motors. After Germany's surrender the company became an entity of the US—via the Marshall Plan. When this was concluded in 1948, the company was returned to its owners, the Blickles. Due to increasing production demands following the economic growth after the war, Ernst Blickle laid the cornerstone for a 10,000 square meter manufacturing facility in Graben, ten kilometers away. In the wake of a plant expansion at a later time, Ernst Blickle also had social rooms constructed for his employees and training workshops.
In 1965, SEW-EURODRIVE presented its innovative modular system for gearmotors. With few basic components, customers are able to quickly configure an end product perfectly tailored to their needs. With this concept, production and assembly can be organized separately from each other. This means that production is organized centrally in a small number of plants with high volumes while assembly is performed as close as possible to the customer. This ensures a greater degree of customization with short delivery times.
After the death of Ernst Blickle in 1987, his sons Rainer and Jürgen Blickle took over as managing partners of SEW-EURODRIVE.

International expansion

In 1960, SEW-EURODRIVE opened its first foreign subsidiary – SEW-USOCOME – in Haguenau, Alsace. Between 1968 and 1969, the company began expanding by opening assembly plants in Sweden, Italy and England.
In 1974, the first employees started their work at SEW-EURODRIVE in Canada, which was the beginning of the American expansion of the company. In 1975 and 1978, the company continued on its course of international expansion by opening production and assembly plants in the US and Brazil.
In the 1980s, new sites in the metropolises Melbourne and Johannesburg were established. Assembly plants in Japan and Singapore marked the beginning of the Asian expansion.
SEW-EURODRIVE has already had its presence in Russia since 1993.
With production and assembly sites constructed in 1994, the Asian expansion continued and SEW-EURODRIVE established itself on the Asian market. Following this expansion, a new branch opened in India in 1997.

Key figures

More than 17,000 employees at over 430 sites worldwide generate sales of over 3 billion euros. SEW-EURODRIVE has 16 production and 79 assembly plants around the world, so-called Drive Technology Centers. 23% of the employees are engineers and computer scientists.

Product portfolio

SEW is partner of the future project for urban and autonomous freight logistics, efeuCampus in Bruchsal, which is funded by the European Union and the state Baden-Württemberg. SEW is responsible for research and development of the autonomous delivery vehicles and the technical infrastructure. SEW is responsible for induction charging systems, for the electrified vehicles, the development of a 5G infrastructure for communication, and the delivery of parcels and recyclables to and from the test area residents. The aim of the project is to transfer innovative solutions from the modern factory to the urban logistics.

Foundations

SEW-Eurodrive-Foundation

In November 1989, Edeltraut Blickle established the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation in memory of her husband Ernst Wilhelm Blickle. Ever since, the foundation has promoted scientific work and the further development of scientific knowledge in the areas of technology and business.

Prizes

The Ernst Blickle Prize, worth 100,000 euros, has been awarded by the SEW-EURODRIVE Foundation since 1991. Today, it is presented every two years. Prize winners are selected by the Board of Trustees and a specially appointed committee according to the foundation charter. Previous prize winners:
In September 1992, Rainer Blickle established the Edeltraut Blickle Foundation. The foundation pursues charitable purposes only. The foundation supports medical research establishments, hospitals and other institutes in the area of health care and people in need of social and medical care.