Balluff acquires software and machine vision companies

Balluff is extending its digital capabilities with the acquisition of two companies: the Stuttgart software company iss innovative software services GmbH (iss) and machine vision company Matrix Vision GmbH (MV) from Oppenweiler near Stuttgart. The relevant contracts were signed in July and August after nearly six months of negotiations. 160 employees will join the family-owned company; the sites in Stuttgart-Vaihingen and Oppenweiler will be kept on.

The two new companies enhance Balluff's core competences in two key fields: software development and machine vision. Their integration thus represents a key building block in the Group's strategic alignment. As managing director Florian Hermle commented: "Linking our network technology with the software expertise of the two companies will particularly improve our capability for supplying integrated automation solutions from one provider. The know-how of iss and Matrix Vision and their employees will help us capitalise on the huge growth opportunities in digitalisation faster, while extending our portfolio in the hardware and software areas."

iss specialises in tools, test systems, processes and standardisation in software development. Like Balluff itself, the main customer group for the company, founded in 1996 and with 60 employees, is the automotive and supply industry. Within the Balluff Group, iss will assume the role of in-house software specialist, as the company is highly experienced in the field of embedded systems for the automotive industry. "We already have 25 software developers in our team, but we are focusing on consistently extending our digitalisation expertise and we urgently need more qualified personnel to do so. To be more specific, we aim to develop open software platforms that will be needed increasingly in the future in order to offer our customers integrated automation solutions," said Hermle.

"We are very happy to now be part of Balluff Group," said Joachim Mettenleiter, one of the two managing directors of iss. "Balluff is undoubtedly one of the industry's digitalisation trendsetters and we are looking forward to the many very challenging and fascinating assignments. I am confident that we will be able to forge ahead with our colleagues in Balluff's software department in the upcoming years and take the group even further than it already is in the Industry 4.0 environment."

Matrix Vision and its product range enhance the Balluff Group in an area of machine vision. Founded in 1986, the company with its 100 employees is specialised in the development and marketing of frame grabbers, standard industrial cameras, video sensors, embedded systems and software in the area of industrial image processing. "Matrix Vision has been a successful development partner to us for the past four years," remarked Hermle. "One of our two camera-based product lines is from Matrix Vision. As a result, we already know that we are well suited to one another and our product lines are optimally matched." At Matrix Vision, around 30 of its 100 employees are mainly engaged in image processing in the industrial sector.

"Matrix Vision lets us extend both our product portfolio in the area of camera-based sensor systems and our software development capacities," said Hermle.

It is an opinion shared by Uwe Furtner, technical managing director of Matrix Vision: "Balluff is an excellent match for us. We have gotten to know each other very well through many years of cooperation in our development partnership, and our product portfolios do not overlap, but rather complement each other perfectly." Furtner also identifies the great potential for Matrix Vision within the Balluff Group in terms of sales and services for customers. "Many of our customers have production sites worldwide and expect local support from their suppliers. At some point Matrix Vision would have run into difficulties on that score, simply due to our size, but with the worldwide service, sales and logistics network that Balluff brings we now have access to a whole different set of possibilities."

Image: The managing directors of all three companies: Uwe Furtner, Erhard Meier (Matrix Vision), Florian Hermle, Katrin Stegmaier-Hermle, Michael Unger (Balluff), Michael Wäschle and Joachim Mettenleiter (iss). Photo: Balluff.