Swiss Krono Group

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Swiss Krono Group
legal form Corporation
founding 1966
Seat Lucerne , Switzerland
management Martin Brettenthaler, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) / Chairman of the Executive Committee
Number of employees 5100,
450 of them in Switzerland
sales CHF 2.0 billion
Branch Wood-based panel industry
Website www.swisskrono.com
Status: 2019

Swiss Krono Group AG is a family-owned company in the wood-based materials industry, which processes the raw material wood into an industrially manufactured mass product. The wood-based materials produced and sold worldwide are divided into the following business areas: Interiors (products for furniture and interior design), Building Materials (high-performance OSB boards for wood construction) and Flooring (laminate floors in a variety of forms). The Swiss Krono Group currently exports with around 5,100 employees to almost two thirds of all countries in the world (121 of 194). The company operates plants in Switzerland, France, Germany, Poland, Hungary, Ukraine, Russia and the USA. Sales in the 2016/2017, 2017/2018 and 2018/2019 financial years each amounted to around 2.0 billion Swiss francs.

history

The entrepreneurial family Kaindl from Austria founded a sawmill in Lungötz near Salzburg in 1897; From 1948 the sawmill produced plywood for the furniture industry, and chipboard followed in 1959. After Matthias Kaindl's death, the company was run jointly by his sons, Ernst and Matthias Kaindl. In 1966 Ernst Kaindl founded the Swiss Krono Group as an AG for the wood industry in 1966 in Menznau near Lucerne in Switzerland. In 1987 the family company was split into the Krono Group Switzerland, the core of the Swiss Krono Group, under the leadership of Ernst Kaindl and the Kronospan Group, which is still based in Austria, under the leadership of Matthias Kaindl and his son Peter.

Further milestones were:

  • 1987 Commissioning of the Sully-sur-Loire , France site
  • 1988 Establishment of the production facility in Vásárosnamény , Hungary
  • 1992 Start of production in Heiligengrabe , Germany
  • 1994 Establishment of the plant in Żary , Poland
  • 1999 Establishment of the factory in Barnwell , South Carolina , USA
  • 2000 Start of production in Kamjanka-Buska , Ukraine
  • 2001 Start of OSB production in Heiligengrabe, Germany
  • 2002 Start-up of the plant in Sharia , Russia
  • 2003 Opening of the subsidiary in Brochniv-Ossada , Ukraine
  • 2004 Opening of the subsidiary in Kharkov , Ukraine
  • 2011 Closure of the plant in Vásárosnamény, Hungary
  • 2016 Restart of the production of OSB boards in Vásárosnamény, Hungary

The company founder Ernst Kaindl died in April 2017; As early as 2014, his daughter from his second marriage, Ines Kaindl-Benes, had gradually taken on responsibility in the company. She has headed the company as Chairman of the Board of Directors since 2017. The operative business is led by Martin Brettenthaler, Chief Executive Officer (CEO) / Chairman of the Group Management since 2016.

Locations

There are ten plants in eight countries (as of May 2018):

  • Switzerland ( SWISS KRONO Switzerland ): 450 employees, around 634,800 cubic meters of annual production volume, products: Interiors, Building Materials, Flooring (under the KRONOSWISS brand) Special feature: the group's first plant
  • Poland: over 1,115 employees, around 1.36 million cubic meters of annual production volume, products: Interiors, Building Materials, Flooring (under the KRONOPOL brand) Special feature: the group's largest plant
  • Germany: 850 employees, around 1 million cubic meters of annual production volume, products: Building Materials, Flooring (under the KRONOTEX brand)
  • France: 410 employees, around 824,800 cubic meters of annual production volume, products: Interiors, Building Materials
  • USA: 180 employees, products: Flooring (under the American Concept brand)
  • Russia: 910 employees, around 909,000 cubic meters of annual production volume, products: Interiors, Building Materials, Flooring (under the KRONOSTAR brand)
  • Ukraine: 750 employees, around 711,000 cubic meters of annual production volume, products: Interiors, Building Materials Special feature: three plants in Ukraine
  • Hungary: 130 employees, around 280,000 cubic meters of annual production volume, products: building materials, specialty: the group's youngest plant, specializing in OSB

Criticism and controversy

According to a report by the Ukrainian newspaper Kyiv Post , the Swiss Krono Group is involved in corruption and illegal timber trade with Ukraine. According to the newspaper, the London-based environmental monitoring company Earthsight has found out that the Austrian timber companies Schweighofer , Kronospan , Lenzing , JAF Group as well as the Swiss company Swiss-Krono and a Polish factory of the American group International Paper are involved in illegal activities related to the import of Ukrainian wood into the EU are involved. The investigation found evidence that roundwood from Ukraine was misleadingly labeled as firewood in customs declarations in order to circumvent the ban on roundwood exports in force since 2015 and the ban on pine wood exports in place since 2017.

Prior to this, journalistic investigations by reporters from the Kiev Post and the project for reporting on organized crime and corruption found evidence of the involvement of the Austrian company Schweighofer in illegal logging in Ukraine. Schweighofer has also called on the European Union to put pressure on the Ukrainian government officials to lift the moratorium, according to the results of the investigation.

According to the latest report by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) , up to a quarter of Carpathian wood is illegally felled - without a permit and in unauthorized areas such as national parks. That corresponds to one million cubic meters of wood per year.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Key figures of the Swiss Krono Group , accessed on December 28, 2018
  2. ↑ a b SWISS KRONO Group in figures , self-reported on the swisskrono.com website, accessed on February 25, 2020
  3. ↑ Balance: The chips fly , (PDF), company portrait of the Swiss Krono Group, January 10, 2011, accessed on May 28, 2018
  4. ↑ UK researchers, Ukraine officials face off over illegal timber exports to EU | KyivPost . In: KyivPost . November 9, 2018 ( kyivpost.com [accessed November 28, 2018]).
  5. ↑ Romana Puiulet and Anna Babinets: Clear Cut Crimes. Retrieved November 28, 2018 .
  6. ↑ EU presses Ukraine to end lumber export ban - Dec. 09, 2016 . In: KyivPost . December 9, 2016 ( kyivpost.com [accessed November 28, 2018]).