Siemens held its Annual Shareholders' Meeting at the Olympiahalle in Munich on January 30, 2019.
We released our first quarter results for fiscal year 2019 on January 30, 2019. The Press Conference and the Analyst Call were broadcast live.
The digital transformation of the producing industry is gaining momentum. Companies from a wide variety of industries are already unlocking this potential – they are using end-to-end digitalization to create a lasting competitive edge by reducing time to market and increasing flexibility, efficiency, and quality. With Siemens Digital Enterprise solutions the technical prerequisites for the implementation of Industrie 4.0 are available and can be deployed in every application and companies of all sizes. At the SPS IPC Drives in Nuremberg, Germany, from November 27 to 29, 2018 – which took place this year under the motto "Digital Enterprise – Implement now" – Siemens showed in hall 11 how this can be done.
Siemens has honored 12 particularly resourceful researchers as Inventors of the Year 2018. Together, these scientists are responsible for some 590 inventions and 589 patents. Two of the inventors are from Germany, three are from Austria, one is each from Norway, France, Poland, Mexico, China, India and the United States. Every year since 1995, Siemens has been presenting this award to its outstanding researchers and developers whose inventions have made major contributions to the company's strong performance. Since 2016, this award has also been presented to researchers from outside the company. In fiscal 2018, Siemens filed around 3,850 patents worldwide – an increase of 200 patents over the previous year. Worldwide, Siemens holds about 65,000 patents. In fiscal 2018, Siemens employees submitted about 7,300 invention disclosures. On a basis of 220 workdays during the year, this figure corresponds to about 33 inventions per day.
Under the motto "Industrialize Additive Manufacturing" Siemens presented its comprehensive solution portfolio for consistent digitalization of additive manufacturing at the formnext 2018, the leading exhibition for additive manufacturing. Starting with the design and engineering software, via innovative simulation tools to complete machine and factory automation, Siemens demonstrated how the industrialization of additive manufacturing can be further accelerated. Furthermore Siemens introduced solutions around peripheral processes, such as automated support removal, surfaces finishing and part removal as well as post processing for intelligent de-powdering solutions. Additional, Siemens presented new business models, which have derived from digitalization in this industry.
We released our financial figures for the fourth quarter and fiscal year 2018 on November 8, 2018. The Press Conference and the Analyst Call were broadcast live.
Agility is the ability to adjust rapidly to changing market conditions, capitalize on emergent business opportunities, and reduce costs or increase revenue streams in the process. In the wake of decarbonization, decentralization, and digitalization, it is the basis for grid operators' and utilities' future business success.
The Siemens booth at EUW 2018 presented combined solutions for electrification, automation, and digitalization that pave the way for multilayered, distributed, and connected grids, this way enabling the required degree of agility.
During the conference, Siemens introduced the new SGT-400 PL Compressor Package, a highly integrated, turnkey gas turbine and centrifugal compressor solution. With field-proven, efficient, and reliable components, this new package offers a single-lift, one baseplate configuration for fast deployment, DLE combustion technology for emissions compliance even at low loads, and expert, 24x7 support for responsive service.
Siemens and the company's Central Works Council have signed a reconciliation of interests based on the framework agreement reached in May. The goal is to increase the competitiveness of the Power and Gas Division (PG) and the Process Industries and Drives Division (PD). At PG alone, costs are to be reduced – as originally planned – by about €500 million worldwide, with €270 million of this amount to be saved in Germany. Around 2,900 jobs will be cut in Germany instead of the roughly 3,400 announced last November. This reduction in job cuts is due, above all, to the continuation of the location in Görlitz, Germany, and the retention of activities at the Dynamowerk, a Siemens production facility in Berlin. However, the measures are not restricted to capacity adjustments alone. Instead, they are primarily designed to achieve structural improvements and systematically sharpen the company's focus on the technologies of the future.
"The market for fossil power generation has contracted substantially. Against the backdrop of this structural change, the agreement we've reached is critical to improving our competitiveness. We now have to implement the measures quickly," said Lisa Davis, member of the Managing Board of Siemens AG.
"In the past few months, market forecasts have again worsened considerably. The job cuts agreed upon with the employee representatives are only one of the measures urgently necessary to improve our cost position. With the reconciliation of interests, we've also reached an agreement on structural changes and new opportunities for several locations," said Janina Kugel, Chief Human Resources Officer and member of the Managing Board of Siemens AG.
Siemens showcased its comprehensive oil and gas solutions at the Turbomachinery & Pump Symposium (TPS), September 18 – 20, 2018 at the George R. Brown Convention Center in Houston, TX. Oil and gas companies have some of the most complex physical and technical operational challenges of any business on the planet. To manage risks, control costs and optimize asset performance, oil and gas operators increasingly rely on digital technologies and analytics to improve efficiencies and safety for all aspects of oil and gas production, distribution and use. Leveraging 170 years of technological and engineering expertise, with extensive experience in operational technology (OT) and information technology (IT), Siemens' suite of innovative technologies deliver cutting-edge hard and software capabilities for equipment and solutions that enhance efficiency, predictability, reliability and safety for its customers.