Specifically, Pilz grew by 6.2% to 306 million euros in the past financial year, which, according to Susanne Kunschert, was "characterized by major fluctuations" in terms of sales. Around 75% of sales were generated in Europe, around 15% in Asia and just under 10% in America. In addition to the Asian countries, the subsidiaries with the greatest growth in 2016 included the national companies in India, Brazil and Southern Europe. In order to continue growing internationally, the company from Ostfildern also invested in the expansion of its sales and service network last year: with the opening of Pilz South East Asia, the number of subsidiaries increased to 40.

According to company boss Renate Pilz, the first three months of the current financial year have also been "really great". However, this will probably be the last time she reports on the figures as Chairwoman of the Management Board at the annual press conference: she will retire from operational business at the end of the year. From then on, the management of the family business will be entirely in the hands of her daughter Susanne Kunschert and son Thomas Pilz - both of whom have been on the management board for a good ten years. Specifically, Susanne Kunschert will take over the "Market" division, for which Renate Pilz has been responsible to date, in addition to her previous tasks (Finance, Controlling, Human Resources and Organization). This includes the Customer Support, Marketing and Communications, Product Management and International Sales departments. Thomas Pilz will continue to be responsible for IT, Purchasing, Research & Development, Quality Management and Production.

I4.0 and robotics are driving change

In absolute terms, the most important sales driver (66%) at Pilz in the past financial year remained the product area of control technology with drive technology. In addition, however, the sensor technology (15%) and services (13%) divisions now each make a double-digit contribution to turnover. According to Thomas Pilz, safe robotics is of particular importance for the further development of the service business in particular: the increasing use of robots in industrial environments is increasingly associated with the closest possible collaboration between man and machine. Thomas Pilz: "We are currently testing the practical use of a fenceless robot application in our own production. A mobile, flexible robot unit supports the process of laser engraving housings. Our application engineers can use this HRC application to test both our products and the necessary steps on the way to safe HRC applications under real conditions."

Another topic that is currently keeping the safe automation specialist very busy is digitalization. With it and the arrival of internet technologies on factory floors, "new players are also entering the market," emphasizes Thomas Pilz and adds: "We used to compete with companies such as Siemens or Rockwell - now companies such as Amazon, Google, SAP or Telekom are also entering the automation stage. We have to face up to this!"

Pilz is responding to this change with enormous investments in research and development, among other things. Around 20% of turnover is allocated to this every year. The relocation of production at the Ostfildern headquarters to the new Peter Pilz Production and Logistics Center at the end of 2015 also created space for the expansion of R&D capacities. To this end, the company is currently converting its previous production and administration building into a state-of-the-art research and development center at a cost of around EUR 7 million.

Industry 4.0 - more than just "colorful pictures"?

At Pilz, what leaves development and ultimately comes onto the market as a product is no longer just about safety. In terms of Industry 4.0, the company is now working intensively on connecting classic automation to the cloud, for example. In response to this, a dedicated IIot gateway based on the Raspberry Pi Compute Module can already be seen at the upcoming Hannover Messe. The topic of the cloud itself and the opportunities it opens up for industrial control technology are also currently at the top of the agenda.

Despite all the euphoria surrounding Industry 4.0, it has also been noted in Ostfildern that the topic is still very difficult for users to grasp - or as Klaus Stark, Head of Innovation Management at Pilz, puts it: "We in the industry are currently all succeeding in painting a lot of colorful pictures about Industry 4.0; however, orientation often suffers at this point." When asked what makes the difference between the factory of today and the factory of tomorrow, Stark replies: "What we have in production today is a planned economy. Someone comes from the top and says what needs to be done, which is then broken down into lines and machines. The future or Industry 4.0, on the other hand, is what we have today as a 'free market economy' - namely autonomous working; this is exactly what we must also implement in automation in the future. The decisive factor here is that the battle will not be fought with products or components, but with the answer to the question of how well we can efficiently and consistently map modular and dynamically changing production structures in engineering."

Finally, Stark returns to Pilz's core competence - safe automation: "If we have more and more modules from different manufacturers in the future, which are found at runtime, both safety and security must be integrated into the module. This is not the case with security in particular today, as the corresponding solutions are generally oriented towards the line or even the plant. In short: we must succeed in making safety and security more clearly visible - and we are working on it!"