The history of Siemens began more than 150 years ago. Today the company is active in many different areas, from digitalization to medical technology to energy supply.
• Siemens and Halske quickly build an international company – and establish electrical engineering
• From electric cars at the beginning of the last century to a successful cooperation with Robert Bosch GmbH to renewable energies
• Siemens today: Digital Industries, Siemens Healthineers & Co.
Siemens and Halske invent the pointer telegraph
The Siemens company history began with a groundbreaking invention: In times when telegraph communication could only be done using Morse code, Werner Siemens and Johann Georg Halske developed the first pointer telegraph – now letters could be communicated directly, making telegraph use accessible to the general public made. For this reason, the two inventors founded the Siemens & Halske Telegraph Construction Company on October 1, 1847. In the following year, 1848, the company was commissioned to build the longest telegraph line in Europe – 500 kilometers between Frankfurt am Main and Berlin – and in the 1850s further large orders were added from abroad.
The two inventors and their company expanded, among other things, the Russian and English telegraph networks and, like some of their descendants, were ennobled by various kings, queens and emperors for their achievements. With their discovery of the dynamoelectric principle in 1866, Siemens and Halske also laid the foundation for electrical engineering and soon developed the first electric railway, an elevator and electric street lighting.
“War-important” Siemens products at the beginning of the 20th century
Siemens & Halske’s Telegraphen-Bauanstalt quickly became a company with many subsidiaries that even built (electric) cars between 1908 and 1926. However, the international subsidiaries became competition during the First World War and the group recorded losses. At the end of the Second World War, many Siemens industrial plants were destroyed by the Allies because they were used to produce “war-important” products. For example, in 1942 the “Siemenslager Ravensbrück” was built near the Ravensbrück concentration camp. In 1944, just over a fifth of the approximately 250,000 Siemens employees here were forced laborers.
It was only in 1950/51 that Siemens & Halske’s Telegraphen-Bauanstalt was able to reach the sales level of the pre-war years again – and in order to be able to continue to prove itself to the competition, the company reorganized itself in 1966: the three subsidiaries Siemens & Halske AG, Siemens -Schuckertwerke AG and Siemens-Reiniger AG were merged under an umbrella organization with the now familiar name “Siemens AG”.
Cooperation with the competition: Successful to date
There was another merger in the following year, 1967: Siemens AG and the competing Robert Bosch GmbH pooled their production, which significantly accelerated production processes and sales. Siemens and Bosch founded BSHG, which is still successful today as BSH Hausgeräte GmbH:
With 40 factories, 58,200 employees worldwide and annual sales of 15.6 billion euros (2021), BSH is one of the world’s leading companies in the household appliances industry and the largest household appliance manufacturer in Europe. The BSH brands include Bosch, Siemens, Gaggenau, Neff, Thermador, Balay, Coldex, Constructa and several more.
As part of the Bosch cooperation, Siemens AG withdrew completely from the direct household appliance customer business by 2000 and even sold its last share in BSH Household Devices GmbH to Robert Bosch GmbH in 2015.
The Siemens offering today: From Siemens Healthineers to Siemens Financial Services
But this does not mark the end of the Siemens story. Under the name Siemens, electrical appliances and accessories for all household areas are still produced and sold and repairs and installation assistance are offered – but at the same time the group is constantly developing in the field of digitalization ever further: After Siemens made media headlines in 2006 with a compliance crisis and the management level was reorganized due to a lack of transparency and unclear distribution of responsibilities, today – since February 2021 under the leadership of Siemens CEO Roland Busch – there are a number of new ones Siemens offers and services.
The Siemens “Industry”, “Energy” and “Healthcare” sectors were founded in 2008. Over time, these sectors gave rise to Siemens companies such as Digital Industries, which, with 76,200 employees and an annual turnover of 19.52 billion euros (2022), supports companies in the automation and digitalization of their internal processes. In addition to Digital Industries, there is Siemens Mobility (digitalization of infrastructure to prepare the world for the growing population), Siemens Healthineers (medical technology) and Smart Infrastructure (networking, low and medium voltage distribution, switching and control technology, fire protection and security) with locations in approximately 200 countries worldwide.
There are also various service and corporate development offerings such as Siemens Financial Services (SFS), Global Business Services (GBS), Real Estate Services (SRE) and Siemens Advanta. In 2016, Next47 was founded, a collaboration program with innovative tech startups that allows Siemens to continue to expand in a variety of directions. In the previous year, 2015, Dresser-Rand – the leading supplier of compressors, engines and gas and steam turbines – was taken over.
Siemens in the future: energy supply and environmental awareness
In 2017, the company’s robotics research was moved to China – and Siemens Gamesa Renewable Energy was founded. Since then, Siemens has also been producing wind turbines. Siemens Gamesa expanded in 2019 with a partial takeover of the manufacturer Senvion. Since the beginning of 2020, Siemens has also been taking care of almost all other areas of energy supply: Siemens Energy was launched.
By the way, environmental protection and sustainability have always been part of the Siemens philosophy. On its website, the company quotes Werner von Siemens from 1884 as part of a developed sustainability concept: “I don’t sell the future for immediate profit!”
Olga Rogler / editorial team finanzen.net
Selected lever products on Bosch
With knock-outs, speculative investors can participate disproportionately in price movements. Simply select the lever you want and we will show you suitable open-end products on Bosch
The leverage must be between 2 and 20
Advertising