On the occasion of the SPS, Christian Wolf reviewed the last 12 months: "After achieving double-digit growth in each of the last two years - 15% in 2017 and 10% in 2018 - we will not quite reach our targets for 2019. The number of employees has remained unchanged to date. It remains almost unchanged at 4650, with the company employing around 2170 people at its four German sites in Mülheim an der Ruhr, Halver, Beierfeld and Detmold.

Turck has further optimized its global supply chain in the last twelve months. Wolf: "With a new production site in Poland, we will be serving the European market directly from 2020 and the expansion of our production in Tianjin, China, will increase our competitiveness in Asia." The Managing Director sees the recently announced minority stake in Duisburg-based radar specialist Asinco as a further step on the way to becoming a 'digital automation company'. Turck not only wants to secure the R&D competence for measuring radar sensors, but also the expertise in the software area, which is particularly relevant for future projects in the smart sensors sector. Wolf intends to benefit in particular from expertise in regulation and control technology, artificial intelligence and firmware. "We have once again invested in software expertise, following the acquisition of RFID turnkey solution partner Vilant Systems in 2017 and the technology buy-out of the cloud software from IoT specialist Beck IPC in the following year."

With the manageable switch in IP67 design, Turck is targeting intralogistics and the agricultural machinery market in addition to production lines in the automotive industry.

© Turck

Under the banner of a Digital Automation Company, Turck is to become a system provider in IP67 niches. Corresponding products were therefore also on display at the trade fair. New, for example, is the '10 Port Managed Switch' with IP67 protection. With the robust TBEN-L-SE-M2, camera applications, for example, can be significantly accelerated thanks to the highest data rates of up to 1 Gbit/s. The high-speed link-up function supports fast tool changes in under 150 ms for minimum cycle times in robot applications. Thanks to the decentralized mounting option directly in the field, the switch also reduces the wiring effort between the control cabinet and Ethernet devices on the machine. The manageable switch offers functions for the secure and efficient organization of industrial Ethernet networks. The integrated firewall provides bidirectional protection against unauthorized access and increases security in the IIoT.