PETpla.net Insider 03 / 2020

TOP TALK PET planet Insider Vol. 21 No. 03/20 www.petpla.net 8 PETplanet: Mr Davatz, these days it is increasingly rare for a man like you to work his way up from apprentice to CEO in the same company. Today, companies seem to be relying more on trained man- agers and less on technical exper- tise. Davatz: There are three fac- tors at play here; the theoretical toolkit, practical experience and the personality of the person involved. People can be skilled in these three areas in different ways. The valu- able building blocks of theory are definitely helpful provided they are combined with practical experience, but personality might be most impor- tant. When managers move com- pany every six months, I don’t think that continuity can be sustained. PETplanet: Netstal is now no longer Netstal; since last summer Net- stal has become KraussMaffei High- Performance AG. What has changed for customers? Davatz: Our parent company KraussMaffei is repositioning itself by bringing together under the umbrella of a single brand, KraussMaffei, the various business areas and previous brands of KraussMaffei, KraussMaf- fei Berstorff and Netstal. The strong name of Netstal lives on as a product brand for our machines. The change of name is happening without any restructuring, which demonstrates the stability of the company and shows our commitment to the Näfels site. We invest a lot in our product pipeline. In addition we will build a new compe- tence center. PETplanet: Yet didn’t KraussMaf- fei HighPerformance AG immediately start working reduced hours in the summer? Davatz: This applied last year to all of plastics engineering and especially to sales involving systems for automotive engineering which suffered a spectacular collapse. We weren’t able to dodge that trend, but the issue of reduced hours is last year’s issue. We’ve moved on. PETplanet: Are you thinking of the product range for preform injec- tion moulding machines with lateral removal? That would be a minor revo- lution for Näfels people. Davatz: Not only that; we are in the process of developing such a machine equipped with a 4,000 kN clamping force. In terms of invest- ment, it is one of the largest develop- ment projects in the entire Krauss- Maffei Group and the biggest in the history of Netstal. Rather than thinking about physical solutions or machines, we are instead focusing principally on the product which will be produced on our systems. So we are thinking about the bottle itself and offering our customers com- plete solutions for this application. This means that we are often able to offer a turnkey package with mould, removal device, dryer and cooler, including a service package. Interview with Renzo Davatz, CEO of KraussMaffei HighPerformance AG From the side – the new Netstal PET product range Since the summer of 2019, Netstal has been renamed KraussMaffei HighPerformance AG. We asked Renzo Davatz – almost 30 years in the company and CEO since 2016 – about the background to this. We were particularly interested in the prospects for the future. Here, Davatz tells us of the development of a new product range with lateral removal – a new approach for the Swiss company, which has previously preferred removal from above. This is how we know Netstal’s PET-Line, with a removal from above. The new 4000 model will feature a lateral removal – a new approach for the engi- neers from Näfels.