Sales of laser manufacturer Trumpf dropped by approximately 8 per cent to €3.5 billion in the 2019/20 fiscal year, ending 30 June 2020. This compares to sales of €3.8 billion for the previous year.
Nicola Leibinger-Kammüller, Trumpf's president and chairwoman of the group management board, remarked that the firm has been feeling the effects of a weaking economy and the reluctance of many customers to invest, particularly in Germany, since autumn 2018.
'We attribute this to the uncertainty associated with the structural change in the automotive industry, among other things,' she remarked. 'It has been our observation that corona has intensified this trend and acted like a catalyst – a crisis within a crisis, so to speak. The central issue here is the uncertainty about the pandemic’s duration and the appropriate measures on the part of government.’
Only a few business fields such as EUV and electronics are currently posting any sales growth, according to the firm.
The biggest single markets after Germany – which had sales of approximately €610 million – were the USA with €490 million and the Netherlands with around €480 million – due to the EUV business with ASML – followed by China with some €350 million.
Trumpf responded to the downturn in business more than a year ago with a programme to boost earnings and by saving on material and personnel costs. The group-wide workforce count currently stands at 14,300 employees, with 7,400 people located in Germany, 4,400 of which work at the Ditzingen headquarters.