Press release
Annual report

Leading the industry with continuity and innovation:

Pöttinger achieves highest turnover in the company's history

Financial year 2014/15 is the fifth special year in a row for Pöttinger: with a turnover of EUR 320.3 million, the family-owned Austrian company has yet again managed to achieve the highest turnover in the company's almost 145-year history and double sales within the last 10 years. The company's success is based on strong customer-driven innovation and partnership-oriented relationships with customers and dealerships as well as a highly motivated team of around 1,650 employees.

More Success with Pöttinger

Pöttinger's aim is to develop reliable products that ideally cater for the needs of customers. The high innovative strength of the family-owned company is backed by years of experience: many of the employees are farmers themselves who understand the challenges from their own experience and who live and work with agricultural technology on a daily basis. That is why the Pöttinger product range is so professional and versatile.

The harvest technology range has been extended by a further highlight: Pöttinger sets a new standard in baling with the IMPRESS round baler concept. The new system is based on the formula: precision multiplied by performance equals excellent working results.

In the tillage, soil preparation and seed drill technology sectors, Pöttinger has also delivered enormous performance in terms of new development and now offers matching soil cultivation concepts ranging from straightforward, cost-effective solutions to extremely high-performance results to meet the highest specifications. This is where the agricultural technology specialist's 40 years of experience in soil preparation implements really shows.

To achieve optimum reliability of the machinery, all innovations are put through their paces in Europe's most modern and unique agricultural technology test centre at the Technology and Innovation Centre (TIZ).

As a consequence, Pöttinger is today a leading tractor-independent specialist for forage harvesting, tillage, seedbed preparation and drill technology.

Pöttinger all the way: ongoing development in all sectors

Grassland technology, accounting for 61 percent in the agricultural technology sector, is the main source of turnover, followed by tillage at around 25 percent. Compared to the previous year, the grassland sector achieved growth of more than 2 percent; tillage and seed drills sales continued to develop at the same rate as last year. Original spare parts business was up around 10 percent on the previous year. A major contribution was made here by the concept for long-term availability of spare parts.

Despite a difficult situation generally on the market, Pöttinger has managed to increase its turnover yet again. The main drivers of growth were the many product innovations mentioned above as well as ongoing internationalisation. Above average development was seen in the Polish, French, Swiss, Australian and USA export markets.

Continuous internationalisation ensures growth

International markets are key to Pöttinger's success. An export quota of around 86 percent and international sales of around EUR 276 million are impressive proof of their significance.

Around 65 percent of agricultural technology sales was attributable to six countries: Germany, Austria, France, Czech Republic, Switzerland and Poland. The top five countries for growth in turnover in terms of absolute machine sales compared to the previous year are Poland, France, Switzerland, Australia and the USA.

France, with 12 percent share of total turnover, represents one of the largest and most important markets after Germany with around 22 percent.

In Poland, an increase of 14 percent was achieved, in France almost 7 percent, in Switzerland 9 percent and in Italy almost 10 percent. Sales in Germany remained around the same level as the previous year (plus 1 percent), while Czech Republic was slightly lower by comparison. The USA region developed very well with an increase of almost 15 percent, likewise Australia, where growth was over 50 percent.

Austrian quality in demand

With a 14 percent share of overall turnover, the domestic market of Austria remains one of the strongest country markets, alongside Germany and France. Year on year, although turnover was down slightly as a result of challenging market conditions, quality from Austria is still very much in demand with Austrian farmers. That is something about which Pöttinger is particularly pleased. That is because the specifications of machinery used in Alpine regions such as Austria demand much experience and engineering instinct during development and enable Pöttinger to display its full set of skills and capabilities.

Everyone needs agriculture

As a family-owned company, Pöttinger feels strongly linked to farming businesses and has been promoting agriculture for many years under the motto "Everyone needs agriculture"; fair business conditions and prices are a cornerstone for the long-term, active structure of farms. Pöttinger therefore invests in activities that promote the positive image and the value of farming produce to establish it firmly in the minds of the consumers. The agricultural machinery manufacturer in Grieskirchen regards this type of campaign as having long-term influence so that arable farmers and dairy farms can look forward to a more prosperous future.

On course, even into the wind

Managing Directors Heinz and Klaus Pöttinger explain, "When we develop products, we think in the same dimensions as our customers: reliability, excellent working results, high level of convenience and efficiency. Our developments and our motivation to excel are based on these factors. That is because we want to contribute to increasing the effectiveness, efficiency and quality of agricultural production. That is how we evolved into an international, tractor-independent specialist for forage harvesting, tillage, seedbed preparation and seed drill technology. We are proud of the results of our efforts: we are the world leaders in the loader wagon segment and have been for many years, we play an international pioneering role in mowing and mulch drilling technology and have developed a strong range of tillage products over the last 40 years. In addition, we want to continue on course for success together with our customers and dealerships."

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Dipl.-Ing. Klaus and Mag. Heinz Pöttinger
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For more information please contact:

Inge Steibl, Alois Pöttinger Maschinenfabrik GmbH., Industriegelände 1, A-4710 Grieskirchen

Tel: +43(0)7248/600-2415, ,

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