German company offers custom, fully automated shoe production solutions worldwide -targeted type of cooperation are commercial agreements with technical assistance

Founded in 1946, the German company is an internationally active, innovative mechanical engineering company that manufactures automated machines and systems for shoe production. Shoe production is a labour-intensive and cost-sensitive production. Contribution margins are usually low and working conditions often difficult. In the wake of stronger consumer demands for sustainable products manufactured with good social standards and ever-shorter product cycles, it is important for shoe producers to use flexible and automated production equipment. This is where the German company provides support. It offers smart automation and supports the planning and introduction of the most modern production and control methods. Application areas are direct soling, sole production, processing of polyurethane (PU), thermoplastics (TP) or rubber (RU). The automations relate to production technology, last clamping plates, communication, transport, conditioning, scanning, data processing, digitalisation, ongoing quality control. Direct soling is the single most cost-effective process of producing shoes per pair for high volume shoe production and simultaneously offers a wide variety of design choices. The use of robots and the automation of work processes are necessary wherever quality, productivity, economic efficiency and increasingly sustainability are required as robots are extremely versatile. For example, they can precisely and reproducibly spray release agents and adhesives, roughen shafts and position lasts, sole parts, steel soles or cleats in the pick & place process. They remove shoes, boots and soles and trim sole edges or guide casting heads. These solutions concern automated material guidance with integrated robots, automation solutions for the gluing processes, graphic human machine interfaces, modern web-based shop-floor controls, remote maintenance, and intelligent data storage. The optional web-based shop-floor control system permanently retrieves all machine and operating data and stores them in a database. Live access to machine data can be gained anywhere and at any time. In this way, the customer can find out about his production at any time and call up his current production and historic data online. The German company is looking internationally for shoe manufacturers who need an experienced partner for the development and modernisation of their production processes. The German SME’s target is to increase their international turnover and to foster modern sustainable production technologies in the shoe industry. The company is looking to cooperate with established as well as emerging players in the shoe industry in the frame of commercial agreements with technical assistance.