Huber and Suhner

Source: Manufacturing Digital

Date :11/13/2007 7:08:34 AM

Excellence in connectivity

After two difficult years, Huber and Suhner is returning to profitability and success. Exec UK looks at the strategies behind the business and its future plans

Written by Rebecca Waters and Produced by Ben Weaver

With flexible, dependable services, Huber and Suhner offers a broad range of products to accommodate its market’s needs; now it is growing to become one of the leading global suppliers of components and systems for electrical and optimal connectivity.

Following a successful merger in 1969, the Huber and Suhner Group focuses on supplying its three main target markets, communication, transportation and industry, with its core competencies: radio frequency, fibre optics and low frequency engineering.

Today the company operates 17 subsidiaries and employs 3200 people in all markets, under its corporate philosophy ‘Excellence in Connectivity Solutions’.

The company attributes its success to this one factor. In return, its employees around the world are offered attractive careers within the business, where they are encouraged to develop and take responsibility for their own actions.

Competitors merge

The present group was formed following the merger between two family owned companies, Aktiengesellschaft R.+E. Huber and Suhner & Co AG. The former, a telegraph wire and cable factory, was established in Pfäffikon by Hans Rudolf Huber in 1882 and the latter was founded by Gottlieb Suhner in 1864, initially to produce metal components for handlooms.

After the merger, the two former competitors underwent several years of restructuring as well as a systematic realignment of product range.

Following a continuous development programme, with great emphasis on establishing an international presence, the company set up a number of subsidiaries. By 1976, the company was being represented in 28 countries simultaneously, while consolidating its research and development activities.

After further development and consolidation throughout the succeeding years, including an acquisition of Champlain Cable Corporation and heavy investment into the technology of carbon fibre-reinforced plastics processing, the group continued to invest in its global presence. Further subsidiaries were then established in France, Hong Kong and Singapore in the early Nineties.

However, a decline in the global economy, particularly in the telecommunications industry in the second half of 2001, impacted heavily on the company.

Following the terrorist attacks in America, Huber and Suhner were forced to cut jobs, and began a portfolio streamlining programme, involving the discontinuation of rubber and moulding production, environmental engineering activities and filter manufacture for telecommunications applications.

Moreover, the leadership troika which it had appointed in 2000 as Chief Executive Committee was reformed, replaced with effect by a Chief Executive Officer. The internal structure of the company also underwent a restructuring programme, being simplified into two business sectors: “Mobile Communications and Electronics” and “Wired Solutions and Networks”. This extensive restructuring resulted in the group ‘strategically re-orientating’ to focus on its present three core competencies and supplying its three main markets: Communication, Transport and Industry.

Accommodating markets

Within these three main markets, Huber and Suhner supply a range of components and systems associated with electrical and optical interconnection technology. The company offers a broad range of high-quality components and customer-service solutions for its telecommunication market as well as being regarded among the world’s leading suppliers of components for base stations and lightning protection components. Huber and Suhner hold the ISO 9001 quality assurance certificate, as well as a number of others awarded by the automotive industry.

Huber’s communication segment is divided into communication equipment and communication networks. Realising the need for high quality, reliable internet connection, Huber uses its knowledge of radio frequency and fibre optic technology to provide product solutions such as fibre optic access products and fibre optic antenna solutions for manufacturers and designers of communication equipment.

Likewise, the group sees that in order to generate revenue from a communication network, it needs to be swiftly deployed. With this in mind, Huber offers product solutions such as fibre optic products, RF and microwave connectors and antenna solutions, which are designed for timely and cost effective installation in a wide variety of networks, including public, private and wireless.

The company is also very active within the transportation market, an area that the company divides into the railway and automotive segments, providing a wide range of solutions. For the automotive industry, the group provides special cables such as coaxial cables and RADOX® Single-core, Multi-core and Battery cables for sophisticated application.

Moreover, Huber is Europe’s leading supplier of cables and cable systems for railways. In this segment, the company provides radio frequency and fibre optic components such as cables and harnesses, RF connectors and assemblies and antenna products. These are used to accommodate the growing demand for in-vehicle infotainment systems, such as wireless internet access. Its antennas for railway applications in particular will accommodate the driving demand for new train-borne services.

Special characteristics are also required by the industrial market of the group. Covering the segments: space and defence, instrumentation - particularly test and measurement - and industrial wiring. Huber offers a wide range of applications and customized solutions tailored to the needs of the different applications, such as ease of installation, transmission capacity and heat and fire resistance.

All products are also manufactured with the environment in mind, meaning that while they are manufactured with emissions taken into consideration they are also resource-saving throughout their life cycles. This is acknowledged from the design stages right through to installation. Huber and Suhner is dedicated to environmentally sound practices and currently holds the ISO 14001 certificate as evidence of this.

Return to profitability

Having returned to profitability, Huber and Suhner is looking to build upon the growing demands of its markets in the future, while consolidating and strengthening a strong position in its target markets by identifying the needs of its customers, shareholders and employees.

In order to maintain this leading position in the long-term, Huber looks to respond to these needs with competitive and environmentally beneficial technologies, products and services, adding new technologies and capabilities to its portfolio in order to maintain market leadership.