As of July this year, IBM Corp intends to spin off its German manufacturing facilities into three subsidiaries. And it also plans to set up a mid-range company by the end of 1993. Computerwoche reports that the semiconductor plants in Bblingen and the factory in Mainz will, in future, trade as GmbHs, and as subsidiaries of IBM Deutschland Produktion GmbH. From January 1 1994, the Mainz factory, which makes platters and disk drives for mid-range and large systems, will become part of the mass storage subsidiary of IBM Corp, as IBM Deutschland AdStar GmbH. According to IBM Deutschland, this step should ensure that the semiconductor firm is in a position to build up its OEM business. Also, setting up both companies should also create a better starting point for possible partnerships. IBM said this does not mean equity exchanges, but rather co-operation – using the factories to full capacity. Over the past two years, the two semiconductor factories in Sindelfingen, and Bblingen especially, were reknowned for their high production costs. The threat to their continued existence increased when IBM decided to produce the 64M-bit chip in the US rather than Germany. The chip was jointly developed with Siemens AG. Because factory managers Klaus Kuhnle in Sindelfingen and Walter Meizer in Mainz are carrying out the restructuring, they both stand a good chance of becoming managing director of their respective companies. At the end of last year, some 6,400 staff were employed in manufacturing-related activities, but there should be about 1,100 fewer by December 1993. As of July this year, approximately 800 of the remaining employees will work at the semiconductor firm, some 2,200 at AdStar and 1,500 will stay with the manufacturing company. According to IBM, the latter will offer technical production services, both internally and externally. The fourth new subsidiary will be IBM Midrange GmbH. From January 1994, it will have total responsibility for the mid-range market and, with a broader range of offerings and a better combination of specialised expertise, IBM’s share of the small and mid-sized company market should increase perceptibly. IBM veteran Horst Rose is responsible for transforming the former mid-range business into a GmbH. The new company, which is based in Stuttgart and deals mainly with AS/400s and RS/6000s, will employ 600 staff. By spinning it off, Rose hopes to improve its image: IBM was formerly associated with big companies and large accounts. But today we already generate a thousand million marks a year from small and middle-sized companies. The managing director designate hopes the more flexible, made-to-measure organisation that the GmbHs could create, will result in a reduction in the cost base and a more customer-oriented approach.
