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50 Years of KELLER Pressure


SICK and Endress+Hauser


sign strategic partnership German sensor company SICK and the Swiss measurement and automation technology specialist Endress+Hauser have agreed on a strategic partnership. Endress+Hauser will take over worldwide sales and service of SICK’s process analysers and gas flowmeters, with a joint venture to be established for their production and further development. The aim of the partnership is to provide customers with even better support in increasing their efficiency and sustainability.


KELLER Pressure was established in Winterthur, Switzerland in 1974 by physicist Hannes W. Keller, the inventor of the integrated silicon measuring cell. This year, KELLER is looking back on half a century of history, development and experience.


KELLER was a child of the 1970s, when glitzy disco balls and bell bottoms were the order of the day. To allow him to continue developing silicon pressure sensors according to his own design, Hannes W. Keller founded the company then called «H.W. KELLER dipl. phys. ETH Druck- und Kraftmesstechnik», now known as «KELLER Druckmesstechnik AG», in Winterthur in 1974.


The company got off to a rocky start. Tobias Keller remembers how his father often improvised by using his mother’s oven for hours on end to test his sensors at different temperatures. There were times when he was unable to pay the salaries of the few employees he had due to a lack of orders. Banks had no faith in his father’s idea either and refused to lend him credit. Financial assistance from Tobias’s grandfather allowed Hannes to keep KELLER alive during this difficult time.


Hannes W. Keller was known for his great resilience and persistence, which ultimately paid off. KELLER would soon find its footing. Growth was spurred on by the fact that, as an established OEM pressure transducer supplier, KELLER took advantage of the international market as a provider of pressure transmitters in the early 80s.


The two brothers Tobias and Mike Keller have been managing the company since 2019 and still rely on independence, healthy, organic growth and their headquarters and production site in Winterthur,


where 1,3 million measuring cells are manufactured every year. With around 500 employees, 11 KELLER branches to date and around 30 distribution representatives globally, the «KELLER Pressure» brand is an international symbol of high-precision pressure measurement technology and rightly bears the «Made in Switzerland» seal of quality.


The complete KELLER range includes pressure transducers and pressure transmitters, gauges, level probes, data loggers, remote transmission units and pressure calibrators. The products are as diverse as their fields of application. KELLER pressure sensors are found in dive computers, coffee machines and laboratories. They are used in groundwater and level measurement and in engine test benches; they regulate the cabin pressure in aeroplanes; they monitor pressure peaks in the oil and gas industry; and they provide protection in explosive applications such as hydrogen production. In short, KELLER products are found in all sectors where pressure must be measured.


The KELLER company will continue playing to its strengths in future. Now as before, the high level of vertical integration and modular structure of KELLER products offer OEM customers a great deal of flexibility. Complete on-site production allows for tailored, customer-specific solutions – even in small production runs. In 2023, KELLER made a name for itself in the semi-conductor industry thanks to the high product quality and accuracy of its sensors.


In Winterthur, KELLER is currently building the «Diamond», a new 12’000 m2 main building where all production will be housed at new workstations starting from 2026. At the same time, the company is fully committed to the digital transformation, another crucial factor in the next chapter of the KELLER success story.


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IET SEPTEMBER / OCTOBER 2024


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SICK and Endress+Hauser signed a joint memorandum of understanding for a strategic partnership in October 2023. Since then, the project has been examined and plans for implementing the cooperation have been drawn up. Following approval by the respective supervisory bodies, representatives of both companies have now signed a corresponding agreement. The closing of the transaction is planned for the turn of the year 2024/2025 and is subject to approval by antitrust authorities.


BRINGING THE LATEST NEWS FROM AROUND THE GLOBE NEWS


Dr Mats Gökstorp (left), chairman of the executive board at SICK AG, and Dr Peter Selders, CEO of the Endress+Hauser Group


As a key aspect of the strategic partnership, Endress+Hauser will take over sales and service for process analysis and gas flow measurement technology completely. Around 800 specialised sales and service employees in 42 countries will transfer from SICK to Endress+Hauser. Customers will benefit by receiving more products from a single source. The global Endress+Hauser sales network will enable additional customers to be acquired, more industries to be reached and new applications to be developed.


From 2025, the production and further development of process analysers and gas flowmeters will be the responsibility of a joint venture in which each partner will hold a 50 percent stake. It will employ about 730 people at several locations in Germany. The joint venture will work closely with Endress+Hauser’s competence centres to drive product innovations forward efficiently.


The two companies’ offerings in process technology complement each other perfectly. SICK’s products are currently used in particular in waste incineration plants, power, steel and cement plants, in the oil and gas industry, in chemical and petrochemical plants and in shipbuilding, for example for analysing emissions in flue gas cleaning or for measuring the flow of natural gas and hydrogen.


“This strategic partnership opens up opportunities for growth and development for SICK and Endress+Hauser. We are taking this path because by collaborating and networking we can achieve more together in a reasonable amount of time than either side could on its own – all this for the benefit of our customers, employees and both companies,” says Dr Peter Selders, CEO of the Endress+Hauser Group.


“Our aspiration is to drive the sustainable transformation of the process industry and to support our customers in leveraging the opportunities presented by decarbonisation. That is why SICK and Endress+Hauser are combining their technological and market expertise. In the interest of our customers and employees, we look forward to the strategic partnership and to shape the future of process automation together,” says Dr. Mats Gökstorp, Chairman of the Executive Board at SICK AG.


Both companies see the sustainable transformation as a business opportunity. Together, they want to provide even better support to customers in important areas such as energy and resource efficiency and climate and environmental protection as well as assisting with the decarbonisation of their production processes. SICK and Endress+Hauser have worked together frequently on an order, project and customer basis. The two family-owned companies also share a long-term corporate approach.


Endress+Hauser and SICK are committed to maintaining attractive working conditions for all employees. “We look forward to welcoming the new colleagues with their valuable expertise to the Endress+Hauser team. The planned transition will be carefully prepared so that we can continue to grow together from day one,” says Peter Selders.


SICK is one of the world’s leading solution providers for sensor-based applications in the industrial sector. With 60 subsidiaries and shareholdings as well as numerous agencies, SICK maintains a presence around the globe. The company has over 12,000 employees worldwide and generated consolidated sales of 2.3 billion euros in the 2023 financial year. The core business of factory and logistics automation, which accounts for more than 80 percent of sales, will not be affected by the partnership.


Both sides are currently working with high priority to ensure a seamless transition of the business at the turn of the year. Until the closing, SICK and Endress+Hauser will continue to support their process automation customers independently.


Emissions from road traffic and domestic heating emissions cited as the main cause of


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Air quality plans must be set up in member states to lower levels of air pollution in regions where EU air quality standards are exceeded for the protection of public health and ecosystems. Most of the air quality plans focus on reducing levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2


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matter with a diameter of 10 µm or less (PM10


From 2014 to 2020, approximately 65% of all reported infringements of air quality standards were linked to heavy traffic in urban areas and proximity to major roads, mainly due to emissions of nitrogen oxides (NOx


northern Europe, with Austria, Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands, Portugal, and former members UK, reporting road traffic as the only source of exceedances. In southern and eastern Europe domestic heating was a key source driving breaches of standards for PM10.


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Around two thirds of steps taken to reduce emissions were concentrated on lowering emissions of NOx from transportation, 12% was targeted at domestic heating and 4% on the agricultural sector. The latter two were found to be significant sources of particulate matter.


According to the EEA report, exposure to air pollution caused a significant number of premature deaths and diseases in the EU member states in 2019; 307,000 premature deaths were caused by fine particulate matter, with 40,400 attributed to NO2 The European Commission aims to reduce the number of premature deaths caused by PM2.5


. by at least 55% compared with 2005 levels, by


2030, in its Green Deal’s Zero Pollution Action Plan. The European Commission has committed to updating policies that reduce air pollution emissions at source, including those generated from road transport and buildings. The European Commission is also updating the Ambient Air Quality Directives to align EU air quality standards more closely with the World Health Organization air quality guidelines published in 2021.


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63234pr@reply-direct.com ). Road traffic was a major source of air pollution in western and ).


breaches of air quality standards across the European Union Over the period 2014 to 2020, 944 air quality plans were submitted to the European Environmental Agency (EEA), according to the briefing ‘Managing Air Quality in Europe’


) and particulate 63193pr@reply-direct.com


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