Endress+Hauser

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Endress+Hauser

Type	Private
Founded	1953
Headquarters	Reinach, Switzerland.
Key people	Dr. h.c. George H Endress (Co-Founder of Endress+Hauser) Ludwig Hauser (Co-Founder of Endress+Hauser) Klaus Endress (CEO, Endress+Hauser AG)
Industry	Instrumentation, Process Automation
Products	Instrumentation
Revenue	▲ €86,400,000 (2006)
Net income	▲ €985,200,000 (2006)
Employees	7,045 (end of 2006)
Website	endress.com

Endress+Hauser (Endress and Hauser) is a Swiss-based instrumentation and process automation company. Endress+Hauser operates in the instrumentation market with offices around the world, producing instruments measuring level, flow, pressure, and temperature. They also produce a range of analytical instrumentation measuring variables in water quality, such as pH/ORP, conductivity, dissolved oxygen, and turbidity. The company produce a range of instrumentation designed for use in dangerous environments and extreme conditions.

Endress+Hauser has 41 sales centers worldwide, which last year produced a turnover of €985 million. The company operates production centers in Germany, Switzerland, France, the UK, Italy, the USA, China, India, Japan and the Czech Republic.

[edit] History

On February 1 1953, Georg H Endress and Ludwig Hauser co-founded L. Hauser KG. By 1957, it was renamed Endress and Hauser. The company started its activities with the sale of an electronic capacitive level sensor imported from England. Today it would probably be called a "garage business" even though the first company premises was a converted bedroom.

The level sensor soon became a success, and the founders quickly began building up their own production facilities.

Sales, which concentrated on South Germany in the early years, were extended to the whole of Germany and then to neighboring countries. Level sensors with different measurement principles were added to the capacitive meters. Later, sensors and devices for other physical variables such as pressure, flow, analytics and temperature as well as technical components, were also developed, produced and sold. Sales and services expanded over the whole of Western Europe. The first overseas branch offices started in Japan and in the USA in the 1970s.

In the 1980s the company started a campaign to meet the "challenge of microelectronics" and to take over the technological lead. The transition from signal-oriented to information-oriented process automation forced E+H to seek active participation in various Fieldbus initiatives; today the company ranks as the global market leader.

In 1995, Dr. h.c. Georg H. Endress, born 1924, passed the leadership of the company to his second eldest son, Klaus Endress who had previously acted as the group's Chief Executive Officer (CEO).

In 1997 the company acquired Whessoe plc, a British instrumentation business.^[1]

E+H have not floated on the stock exchange, and continue to be a family owned business, employing Dr. h.c. George H Endress's children inside the organization.