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| Dräger Medical shortlists possible sites for new company headquarters and production plant / Sites still in with a chance: Hamburg Metropolitan Area, Lübeck, and Czech Republic / China and Lüdersdorf no longer in the running |
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| Lübeck, 27.10.2004 – As announced by Drägerwerk AG, Lübeck, following a meeting of the Supervisory Board of Dräger Medical AG & Co. KGaA, there are now four realistic options for the future site of Dräger Medical: |
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- company headquarters in Lübeck with production plant in the Czech Republic
- company headquarters and production plant in Lübeck
- company headquarters in the Hamburg Metropolitan Area and production plant in the Czech Republic
- company headquarters and production plant in the Hamburg Metropolitan Area
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The other sites which were assessed, with the company headquarters and production plant in Lüdersdorf in the Mecklenburg region, or Shanghai in China as a site for the entire Lübeck production facility, have been rejected. Among the arguments against the plant in China were the high logistics costs of delivery to the European market, while Mecklenburg would only offer a slight financial advan-tage over the current Lübeck site and would entail disadvantages in terms of "soft" factors. |
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| The proposal presented on 11 October by the State of Schleswig-Holstein and the Hanseatic City of Lübeck to improve factors relating to the Lübeck site would compensate for the disadvantages prevailing at the current site so long as it can be agreed in a binding manner and implemented. The advantage of this site is the fact that part of the existing infrastructure could continue to be used. |
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| The main arguments in favour of the Hamburg Metropolitan Area are the "soft" factors, e.g. a highly attractive site for customers, employees and applicants, excellent infrastructure, high industrial density and proximity to a large number of institutes of higher education. |
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| A production plant in the Czech Republic would bring long-term cost savings of around 15 million euros a year (plus possible tax effects), of which some 8 million euros would be personnel costs. |
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| A key consideration in the site decision, however, are the measures which need to be taken to make labour more flexible, reduce labour costs and increase produc-tivity.
In the company's opinion, the contributions it expects its employees to make to keep production in Germany, such as working hours geared more to the custom-ers' needs, are by no means unreasonable, especially as there is no talk of pay cuts for the workforce. At the same time, Dräger Medical is thinking about investing more than 50 million euros to improve significantly the company's international competitiveness and thereby secure jobs in Germany.
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| Over the next few days the dialogue with staff, works council and the IG Metall union will continue and negotiations will be started with Dräger aiming to make Northern Germany also a viable site for production. By the end of December the company will decide on one of the four options described above. |
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