— By Plasteurope.com staff — 

While the rest of the mechanical engineering industry spreads bad news about the state of the economy, Austrian injection moulding machine manufacturer Engel (Schwertberg; www.engelglobal.com) remains optimistic. “We don’t have to and don’t want to mope here, we want to have fun at the trade fair,” said European CEO Christopher Vitz at the ongoing Fakuma trade fair in Germany. In all likelihood, the Austrian company will also have to accept a decline of 7% in the 2024/25 financial year (31 March) – previous year was a minus of 6% – and end up with a turnover of EUR 1.5 bn.

However, Engel’s executive board is confident that it has bottomed out. “A trend reversal is currently conceivable, but it will take time for this to develop further,” said Vitz and added: “There are at least signs of a slight upward trend.” He is “not dissatisfied” with the current order intake, even though Engel expects orders to be around 2% below the previous year’s figure. 

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Vitz also said he’s pleased with the development in all four business segments – Automotive, Technical Moulding, Packaging, and Medical; he even mentioned a “small boom” in Medical. Business with medical technology products is developing “very nicely and very stably”, he said.

Nevertheless, Engel is also suffering as part of the general economic downturn, CTO Gerhard Dimmler said. Although there is no employment policy instrument in Austria like short-time work in Germany, working time accounts have been in place for a while. They are being utilised this year and are to be used in the coming year as well. Dimmler added that “according to today’s perspective, there are no plans to cut jobs”. Engel currently employs around 7,000 worldwide, including 3,400 in Austria.