FULL STORY
Former printing press manufacturer Manroland AG’s Plauen plant in Saxony is to close approximately twelve months after its initial insolvency was announced. This was reported by German newspaper Freie Press on 19 December. According to insolvency administrator Werner Schneider, production is to be ‘shut down as soon as possible’ once existing orders are completed. Provisional dates have already been reported to be as early as 12 or 14 January, 2013.

The remaining approximately 250 employees in Plauen will be subsequently transferred for six months to a transfer company, said the reports in the Freie Press, Saxony’s largest newspaper. In February 500 of the once almost 800 employees in Plauen in the former East German GDR were laid off. Now, sadly, the remaining 250 employees are to lose their jobs early in the New Year.

In a subsequent press release, insolvency administrator Werner Schneider described the closure as inevitable. The reasons he cited are a ‘sustained loss situation due to low utilisation of production and the final collapse of the sale negotiations with potential investors in a worsening economic situation in the industry.’ According to Schneider, the decision to close the Plauen site has not been easy for all involved parties. Apparently, consideration is to be given for turning the site into an industrial park.

Schneider had completed his work as Adminstrator in February when the Augsburg plant, housing Manroland Web Systems, was sold to the Possehl Group in Northern Germany, and the Offenbach Sheetfed Systems plant, together with the international sales and service organisation, was sold to UK-based Langley Holdings. Recently there had been negotiations with Austrian machine manufacturer Kostwein, for the sale of the Plauen plant. This, however, collapsed due to the high level of investment required.

Manroland filed for bankruptcy in November 2011. For the plants in Augsburg and Offenbach buyers were found by February of this year. At one stage it was hoped that the Plauen site could survive and also become part of Possehl, as a supplier to Manroland Web Systems in Augsburg, provided additional outside work could be obtained in order to substantially improve utilisation and production. This did not materialise. Of the total of about 4,700 people from the original Manroland AG company, around 2,500 jobs were lost in Germany alone.

Based on a press release posted by Schneider Geiwitz & Partner, dated 19 December, and articles in Freie Press and Deutscher Drukker also on 19 December.