Global Fastener News

The Bossard Headquarters

John Wolz

The entrance to the Bossard complex in Zug, Switzerland, features a metal sculpture of a 20-ft-high arrow pointing �onward and upward.� The von Felix Fehlman sculpture was a gift by employees in 1983 to the company.
Inside the highly automated stacks of the warehouse one robotic machine can pick 11 different products in one run, day or night.
Automation allows the warehouse to be more compact and the picking more reliable, CEO Henry Bossard explained.
The facilities can hold 417,180 small pallets.
The last warehouse addition cost �8 million Swiss francs in mechanicals, 8 million in software, but only 4 million to build,� Bossard said.
As Bossard proudly explains the assembly process, he notes that workers had to learn to be careful of the automation. On the first day one packer set down a sandwich, and it got picked up seconds later in a carton.
�We still don�t know what customer got it,� Bossard mused.
The Bossard Group ships an average of 1,654 orders per day from Zug. The orders total an average of 9,337 small pallets with 6,812 line items per day.
Many packages go out with computer labeling, so the ultimate customer in one country doesn�t know it came from Bossard in Switzerland.
The entire operation is so efficient that �we even ship for competitors,� Bossard pointed to several pallets stacked with packages ready to go.
Bossard is particularly happy to show the returns area. �This is my pride,� he boasted as he pointed to empty shelves. The company is currently operating at only one out of 6,000 picks being wrong.
Bossard�s headquarters is in northern Switzerland, about a half hour from Z�rich. Zug, population 23,000, has picturesque late-Gothic buildings in its old town, dominated by the hallmark Zyttrum tower. Zug is known for recreational activities, including hiking, sports and cycling, and water sports on Zug Lake.

Bossard Sales: 2001 Swiss francs 507 million (U.S.$325.4 million)
2000 CHF 535 million
Stock Price: End 2000 CHF 68.60End 2001CHF 30
Bossard announced that sales for the first four months of 2002 �remained at the expected low level of some CHF40 million per month,� but �cost and capacity adjustments introduced in the prior year when demand began to fall really took effect in the first four months of the current year.� That yielded profits exceeding CHF 1 million per month for the first four months this year, contrasted to monthly losses averaging more than CHF 3 million in the last four months of 2001.
Swiss Stock Exchange Symbol: BOS/BOSZ.S
Customers: Alstom, Asea Brown Boveri, Ascom, Berninina, Bosch, Briggs & Stratton, Compaq, Fritschi, Generac, General Electric, John Deere, Leica, Martin Lighting, MBK, Nokia, Schindler, and Siemens.
Bossard has 75 subsidiaries in three geographic regions.
Key executives: Dr. Kurt Reichlin, chairman; Henry Bossard, CEO;
Bossard Group management: Henry Bossard, CEO; David Dean, CFO; Julius Brun, chief of staff; Peter Furrer, CEO Europe I; Peter Erlangsen, CEO Europe II; Peter Vogel, CEO USA; Scott MacMeekin, CEO Asia-Pacific; Martin Kaul, CEO, assembly automation.
Headquarters: Bossard Holding AG, Steinhauserstrasse 70, CH 6301 Zug, Switzerland. Tel: (41) 41 749 66 11 Fax (41) 41 749 66 22 E-mail: investor@bossard.com Web: bossard.com \ �2002 FastenerNews.com