The Sennheiser Group, which in the year under report consisted of the parent company plus four domestic and 13 foreign subsidiaries, and the joint venture Sennheiser Communications A/S, raised its sales by EUR 24.5 million in 2004 to a figure of EUR 261.7 million. Profits increased to EUR 13.2 million, which already takes into account a special effect resulting from a fire at the Tullamore production plant in Ireland. "Last year, Sennheiser benefited in particular from the general upturn in the global economy," commented Rolf Meyer, president marketing and sales and speaker of the executive committee, on the 2004 figures. "We achieved substantial growth rates in all markets. New and innovative products in all business areas further enhanced that positive trend."
Sennheiser boasted especially good growth in the regions of the Americas and Asia and Australia. The regions of Northern and Eastern Europe, Central Europe and Western and Southern Europe and Africa also showed positive trends. Wireless microphones accounted for the largest share of sales, followed by headphones and wired microphones. Sales by the joint venture Sennheiser Communications A/S (set up in 2003) increased putting it in third position in the segment of telecommunications headsets.
The fire at the Irish production plant in Tullamore, where high-volume headphone manufacturing for the Sennheiser Group is concentrated, cast a shadow over the year 2004. "Thanks to the great commitment of our Irish workforce and vigorous support from Germany, we managed to resume production sooner than originally expected," commented Volker Bartels, president manufacturing. In the course of rebuilding and refurbishing the factory, Sennheiser invested in state-of-the-art manufacturing technology, including a fully automatic capsule production line, which will ensure the future viability of Sennheiser Ireland. At the Albuquerque plant in the US state of New Mexico, the course has been set for expansion of the manufacturing activities.
Consistently high investments in research and development the company introduced more products to its portfolio. "Particularly successful new products include the evolution wireless G2 radio microphone series, and the evolution 900 wired microphones," summed up Dr. Heinrich Esser, president research and development. "In the consumer sector, new wired and wireless headphones were developed for the medium and lower price segments, while new GuidePort software packages now provide museums and theme parks with a wide range of visitor guidance options. At the end of 2004, we launched new headset microphones for the broadcasting and MI markets, which were successfully used, for instance, at the Eurovision Song Contest 2005."
The number of employees rose by 4.4 per cent over the preceding year to an average of 1648. The workforce is expected to continue to rise over the coming years, amongst other things as a result of increased recruitment at the Albuquerque location.
The company's strong investment activities, combined with further product launches, e.g. in the wireless microphone and telecommunications segments, mean that the prospects for anniversary year 2005 are looking good. Moreover, Sennheiser expects to see further growth from the new group company K+H Vertriebs- und Entwicklungsgesellschaft mbH.
(Sarah Rushton-Read)
