Overall, the supplier to the mechanical and plant engineering sector recorded turnover of €5.5 billion in 2017. Incoming orders rose by more than 27%. Building on this, Bosch Rexroth was able to continue the strong development of 2017 in the first months of this year. According to Rolf Najork, CEO of Bosch Rexroth, the good start to 2018 gives cause for cautious optimism: "The demand situation in the industrialized countries has been pleasing so far this year. Regionally, Europe is showing comparatively strong momentum. In contrast, we expect the growth of our business in China to be slightly weaker than last year."

In regional terms, Bosch Rexroth grew most strongly in the Asia-Pacific region last year, with a 20.7% increase in sales compared to the previous year. However, the Americas and Europe regions also developed positively - with sales growth of 10 % and 8.5 % respectively. In Vietnam, Bosch Rexroth secured a major order for the construction of a new storm surge barrier in Ho Chi Minh City. The company also further expanded its international presence with the acquisitions of Maestranza Diesel in Peru and Hytec Holdings in South Africa in March 2018. At the end of the year, it employed more than 30,500 people worldwide, around 3.5% more than in the previous year.

Bosch Rexroth's vision of Industry 4.0

With connected manufacturing technologies for Industry 4.0 applications, Bosch Rexroth is occupying an important market of the future. The fully networked factory, as envisioned by Bosch Rexroth, is an intelligent room in which only the floor, sides and ceiling are fixed. Everything else is freely movable, with production setting itself up and setting itself up flexibly - from one-off production to mass production.

"This factory of the future is our vision of Industry 4.0, and Bosch Rexroth is consistently aligning its portfolio for the future of fully networked industry accordingly," explained Najork. At the upcoming Hannover Messe 2018, the technology company will be presenting its concept of the factory of the future and showing what it is already achieving in factory automation today and what solutions it is developing for tomorrow and beyond.

As part of its focus on future topics, Bosch Rexroth is systematically expanding its expertise in the field of robotics. With the collaborative robot APAS assistant, the company is expanding its portfolio of automated production assistants. Bosch Rexroth is also strengthening its position with two start-up teams from the Bosch start-up platform Grow: Intralogistic Robotics develops software for the networking and automation of material handling. "This enables us to offer our customers solutions for the factory of the future that cover the entire value chain," explained Najork. Deepfield Robotics develops networked and autonomous machines for sustainable agriculture. They reduce the consumption of pesticides and water, for example by using intelligent cameras to detect weeds and remove them without the use of pesticides.