Hörmann in Kirchseeon: The business with the sirens – Ebersberg

If the Hörmann company had been dependent on its sirens alone, it would probably have been less successful than it was in the first two and a half decades after the fall of the Wall. After all, the end of the Cold War and the rapprochement between East and West in the reunified Federal Republic had also determined political action with a feeling of increasing geopolitical security. As a result, more and more warning sirens disappeared from the roofs in both the old and the new federal states. Around 40,000 of the 80,000 alarm systems were dismantled and not replaced. For the company based in Kirchseeon, one of the pillars of its business could have faltered, at least in relation to domestic business. In Kirchseeon, however, more emphasis was placed on maintenance contracts for existing systems than on new installations. Internationally, however, things looked and still look very different.

While warning systems in Germany were taken down from the roofs and scrapped – in the Bavarian state capital, for example, there is not a single warning siren left – other countries were upgraded. In 1993, for example, the Hörmann company in Singapore installed a nationwide warning system that is still in operation today. In Israel, too, the company has contributed to alarm protection with its sirens, and in Sweden it has been responsible for a multi-year project to secure coasts and ports, which is not yet fully completed.

Hörmann made half a billion in sales in the first year of Corona

And now it looks as if the group of companies with its 27 subsidiaries and most recently 2934 employees, who made half a billion in sales in the first Corona year and have long been dealing with completely different lines of business, are also experiencing an upswing in their core business in Germany. Around 90 million euros flow through the Federal Office for Civil Protection and Disaster Assistance into a funding program for the reinstallation and new installation of siren systems, and since the federal election there has been a clear movement in the incoming orders, explains Johann Schmid-Davis, CFO of the Hörmann Group. The floods that devastated the Rhineland-Palatinate Ahr Valley last July raised awareness of the newly created need for far-reaching alarm systems. The nationwide siren warning day in September 2020 had also shown that there is a need for action – in some areas and parts of the municipality, including in the Ebersberg district, there was simply nothing to be heard when the warning sound was supposed to increase.

Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg are among the seven federal states that have signed a corresponding administrative agreement on the purchase of new sirens or the modernization of existing siren technology – and so the people from Kirchseeon are now in demand when it comes to climbing onto the roof of communities anywhere in Germany. Such as in Rechberghausen in the district of Göppingen, where three systems are to be installed. However, it is questionable when the first sirens will actually hit the roofs. According to Schmid-Davis, there are now tenders in a number of large cities. However, it is a long way from the municipal fundamental decisions on tendering, bidding and awarding, “maybe we can do it in 2022”.

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The two-man business founded by Hans Hörmann in Munich in 1955 was not much more than a red VW bus. The graduate engineer concentrated with one employee on the project planning and construction of lightning protection systems, a year later the number of his fitters had already increased to ten, in 1962 the engineering office became Hörmann KG, then based in Stade in Lower Saxony. At the beginning of the 1980s, the company moved to Kirchseeon, where its headquarters are still located today. At the time, Hörmann had already become the market leader for warning systems through its rise to the narrow circle of suppliers for the Federal Office for Civil Protection in Bonn Schools erected, intruder alarm and surveillance systems developed and manufactured.

After moving to the district of Ebersberg, Hans Hörmann began to spin off more and more areas of the company into independent companies, such as facade construction. In 1987 he founded Hörmann Logistik as a developer for intralogistics systems. A fully automatic small parts warehouse for the specialist wholesaler Richter + Frenzel with conveyor technology and carton unfolders should be mentioned in this area. In Würzburg, trams have recently been running that were mechanically constructed by Hörmann Vehicle Engineering in Chemnitz. A Hörmann Group company is also responsible for the logistics of storage in high racks, automated pallet filling and the compilation of daily batches at the Berchtesgaden and Weihenstephan dairies. “This is a highly sensitive area,” emphasizes Schmid-Davis, “the milk has to get to where it’s supposed to go and the cold chain must never be interrupted.”

The company’s digital HD cameras hang in the tunnels of the Turin subway

Similarly high requirements apply to the system control in local transport. 100 digital HD cameras from Hörmann are hanging in the tunnels and air shafts of the underground in Turin. A screen area of ​​a good seven square meters shows the trains arriving and departing the Metropolitana di Torino. Hörmann also has a solution for Nuremberg, where self-driving trains are currently being used, explained Schmid-Davis, as well as for intelligent control systems for charging stations. Hörmann Automotive in Wackersdorf buys and assembles the components for e-charging stations and checks their compliance with calibration law. 250 to 300 charging stations now leave the factory every month, and there is also such a pillar at the edge of the car park in front of the company premises in Kirchseeon – right next to one of the Hörmann antennas. Which, as Schmid-Davis explains, have long been characterized by their independence from the power supply. Equipped with batteries, “the siren can still wail even if the power fails”. Connected to the Tetrasystem SRL, the authority or blue light radio, one is also independent of mobile communications – so if a radio mast breaks in the flood, the digital sirens continue to work.

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Hörmann Industries builds torsion-resistant body frames and cabs for manufacturers of agricultural machinery and commercial vehicles – steel is therefore one of their most important raw materials. “We need 250,000 tons, so the entire Eiffel Tower once a week,” explains the CFO – a circumstance that hit the company in the first few months of the pandemic, when there were supply bottlenecks worldwide. In the meantime, however, Hörmann is well positioned when it comes to steel. “Our warehouses are full,” says Schmid-Davis, the problem now is more the customers, especially car and commercial vehicle manufacturers, who cannot process their orders because of missing components.

Despite the pandemic, 2020/2021 was a very good financial year, which is not least due to the company founder’s motto, which was issued early: “Crises will always come,” he said, “that’s why you have to position yourself in such a way that you always have both feet standing firmly on the ground.”

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The senior is now 93. In the early 2000s he received the Federal Cross of Merit for his commitment in East Germany, where he took over and continued to run many companies. In the 90s he retired from active management, but was chairman of the advisory board until 2021. Hans Hörmann still invites all managers once a year, says the managing director, and is informed about all developments. In the large conference room at the headquarters in Kirchseeon, whose wall paneling and furnishings Hörmann bought from an innkeeper from the Salzburg region and had it modified for the company headquarters, he still looks out at the events from a large portrait on the wall. According to his decrees, the majority of the company should remain in the hands of the family. Hörmann’s youngest daughter Anna, the only one of his children who works in the company, could one day take over the overall management, at the moment she is managing director of the Hörmann Digital division.

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The Hörmann Foundation emerged from the company. It invests in geothermal energy and photovoltaic systems, supports young students at the Technical University of Munich with a scholarship and supports a children’s hospice.