A new extension featuring a production hall bathed in light, a fancy showroom for presenting the latest products and projects, modern office workspaces and meeting rooms – and centre stage are his machines. Dietmar Meurer (50), Owner and Managing Director of Meurer-etechnik, which is based in the tranquil rural setting of Grossmaischeid, Germany, proudly shows off his newly acquired enclosure machining centre and cable processing system.

"Visitors to our site can see for themselves just how innovative we are. Our company has made significant progress over the past few years and is now gaining real momentum", says Meurer, delighted with how things are going. The entrepreneur has every reason to be pleased because he has rightly made the pivotal decision to systematically invest in automation and digitalization.

Investing unprecedented amounts

After all, investing five and six-figure sums is anything but a routine matter. “We weren’t used to spending that amount of money on machinery,” Meurer admits. Although there were understandably questions about how long the investment would take to pay off, he took the plunge. “These kind of number games aren’t much use to me, however. What’s much more important is considering whether in three, five or ten years’ time, we will still be able to compete or even survive on the market without state-of-the-art automation technology.” Besides crunching numbers, Meurer assesses the whole picture with entrepreneurial courage and foresight. “You first have to invest in a machine before you can harness its potential.”