Kiefel restructures and closes in Austria

Kiefel, a market leading company for thermoforming and joining technology and member of the Brückner Group, is announcing a structural reorientation and therefore an accompanying consolidation of its sites. 

In the future, Kiefel will focus increasingly in the packaging area on new standardized automation solutions and leave the volatile special automation business. Furthermore, the specific skills of the respective sites of the global production network of Kiefel and its parent company, the Brückner Group, should be used more effectively in the future. These production units will also be more strongly aligned toward the respective requirements of global customers.

As a result, the production unit for tool manufacturing for fibre and tilting machines as well as automation of thermoforming machines at the Micheldorf (Austria) site will be integrated into other sites. Kiefel will therefore close the site with its approximately 130 employees. The accompanying reduction in staff will take place progressively and be completed at the latest by the end of 2025. A social plan is being finalized with the works committee. Employees at the site were informed about this step today during an employee meeting.

“The market situation in engineering is still facing large challenges. In order to remain continuously competitive, we must make better use of the strengths of our respective production sites for our customers locally. That also means that we must unfortunately separate ourselves from this site,” explained Matt Sieverding, CEO of Kiefel. “The consolidation of technologies and skills will make it possible for us to offer our customers optimized and innovative solutions”.

Existing orders will still be fully completed in Micheldorf. As a result of the company's global production optimization, the Sprang-Capelle (Netherlands) site will be strengthened as the center of excellence for tool manufacturing. The same applies to the head office in Freilassing (Bavaria) for the area of automation. “The closure of the site in Micheldorf is very difficult for us because we are of course very aware that this means a very difficult situation for our employees there. For this reason, we will provide our personnel with particular support during this phase”, concluded Matt Sieverding.