• KIMO offers the right AC or DC solution for every drive requirement
• Soft-starters/braking equipment, AC converters and DC control equipment
• KIMO has the know-how for all industry sectors
• KIMO can flexibly respond to customer requirements
• After sales service
• Commissioning
  Training in KIMO and on-site

For a considerable time now, electrical power has played a major role in our economy - and when it comes down to it, the economy depends on it. This represents all sorts of challenges for manufacturers of electronic and electrical equipment.

The demands of the machinery- and plant construction industry must be continually fulfilled to increase machine performance and production quality using innovative, state-of-the-art drive components.

KIMO took on this ambitious challenge right from the word go. Considering that the company was founded with only a low starting capital, the business acumen of the company founder was clearly evident, which was the basis for the continuous - and in some instances - sudden rise.

However, this success story would not have been conceivable without highly motivated teams in development, sales/marketing, production and order administration. We would like to take this opportunity to thank our employees, and especially our customers and partners which made this anniversary possible in the first place. The only thing that remains to be said is that we hope this will continue into the next decade, beyond the millennium – and we are already off to a good start.

Jürgen Röder

Looking back 10 years

KIMO was founded back in 1989 by Jürgen Röder, who not only contributed 16 years of experience in drive engineering, gained as an employee of Siemens AG, but also his entrepreneurial spirit from his Nuremberg business which has been in the family for many generations. The start was based on two drive-control product ranges which had already been introduced into the market.

LEKTROMIK® Electronic motor control devices, soft-start- and braking equipment, and
TRANSOMIK® Electronic AC drive converter using MOSFET technology

With nearly 20 employees, including product specialists, who were brought on board with the purchase of the product groups, even in the year it was founded, KIMO had a turnover of approximately 800,000 German Marks.

The name KIMO, which at first may sound Japanese, stands for
 

K	Competence and continuity
I	Intelligent ideas
M	Motivated employees
O	Open for unconventional and tailored drive solutions

- company, well established in the market.

• High degree of specialist competence in the application, engineering, configuring up to commissioning
• Powerful development team to be able to quickly implement customer requirements
• A large stock of preferred equipment so that KIMO can deliver on short notice
• Present throughout Germany using established partners
• Initially, agents in Europe, including Sweden, Finland, The Netherlands, Switzerland and Austria. These were soon followed by France, Belgium and Spain.
• Today, KIMO is active worldwide with partners in Japan, Korea, Australia, Hong Kong and is serving the market in the Far East through a joint venture company in India.

KIMO can point to a complete series of solutions tailored to specific industries, for instance, for
 

Cranes Warehouse systems Steel mills Elevators Conveyor systems Heating technology (glass industry) Heating - air conditioning - ventilation Hoisting solenoids Winder drives

License contracts for brand labeling were in place

• SIMOTRAS® - compact drive converters for cranes
• Soft starters / braking equipment
• Elevator control devices
• AC drive converters

Already back in 1990, KIMO developed and supplied the first inverter for photovoltaic systems, which allows power to be fed back directly into the public network. Regenerative power systems, which today are increasingly becoming a political issue, have already had a long tradition with KIMO.
 

The first coupling into the line supply using inverters for photo-voltaic systems was presented at the BMFT booth at the Hanover Fair `91, and REKOBA, a special elevator control device, at a common booth.

However, KIMO also continued to innovate its own product groups. At the end of 1990, a new series of electronic braking devices for three-phase motors up to 200 kW were also presented to the trade press such as the electronic TRANSOMIK® braking chopper.

* Registered trademark of Siemens AG

With the business volume which KIMO was enjoying, the space required to store components and equipment increased significantly. To handle this situation, KIMO purchased an IBS high-bay racking system – for which KIMO had previously developed a dedicated system – and it was only fitting that this should return home to KIMO.

At the same time, special solutions have been realized for stage-lifting equipment pump drives wire-drawing machines sectional doors packet distribution centers bottle filling equipment to mention just a few of the most important

Initiated by inquiries for crane systems, for example, in 1992, the TRANSOMIK® braking choppers were innovated and supplemented.

Between ´92 and ´93, the new EMC law came into force in Europe which had an important impact on our daily business. KIMO quickly implemented this EC legislation. On 28.03.93, KIMO had an EC certificate of conformity stating that it fulfilled the EMC Directive for TRANSOMIK F AC drive converters. This was at a time, where some suppliers in the sector were still scrambling to understand the situation.

KIMO worked at full speed to ensure that the most important products of their portfolio conformed to the latest EC Directives. Well before the mandatory end date in 1997, KIMO had products which were certified to be in conformance with the EMC Directive and had the CE marking. Gearing up for the future, equipment which was interesting for the North American market, was prepared for UL listing.

In order to complement the product spectrum, the stage was set for the fully-digital MotorMaster AC drive converters.

KIMO brought all of the sales partners and OEM customers up to speed on all of the products and specific applications in the training center which had been set-up in 1990.

KIMO takes its after-sales service extremely seriously. It goes without saying that specialists are at the disposal of customers and agents when it comes to commissioning.
 

Know-how and experience gained from commissioning work and our own measuring laboratory were made accessible to all of our partners in the form of regular reports under the title "New info from the test laboratory".

At the end of 1995, a KIMO article on the subject of EMC was published in the "antriebstechnik" trade periodical. This enjoyed considerable acclaim and was only surpassed by the tremendous resonance from the KIMO EMC Compendium at the beginning of 1996.

KIMO played the leading role in the implementation of the EMC Directive and published a Compendium on the subject of EMC. Immediately, this had the most reader inquiries in the trade publication SCOPE, with 486 responses, about this handy little booklet.

In the middle of 1996, the company founder took the appropriate measures to guarantee and secure the future of KIMO - a small but well-established company. After an intensive search, the right partner was found in the form of Berliner Elektro Holding AG. This is a holding company for individual companies within the Group to ensure stability, secure jobs and to provide the advantages of a large company: Security with the right amount of capital in conjunction with the ability of each individual company to flexibly act, and be responsible for their daily business.

Berliner Elektro Holding AG (BEH) was founded in 1984, and an excellent idea was transformed into reality:

Medium-sized companies, with a complementary portfolio, were combined to become an effective unit and then placed on the stock market.

BERLINERELEKTRO Holding AG

In the middle of 1997, due to illness, the company founder handed-over management, to a well-proven team from production-, sales/marketing- and technical specialists - a modern management concept.

At the Hanover Fair 1997, KIMO together with another BEH company presented the product portfolio expanded by DC control units at a common booth. In addition to the Hanover Fair, KIMO also participates in trade exhibitions through their regional industry-sector specific sales partners. This is an important element in the marketing mix, which will be expanded in the future.

An additional example for industry-sector cooperation is the common development of a new generation of AC converters for closed-loop speed control with cpc® system with the Erba Kälte Company.

The decision made in 1997 to place more significance on DC drives, which were once considered to be antiquated, turned out to be correct in 1998. Using the SIMOREG® and GISIDIG units, today, KIMO can offer a tailored drive solution for almost every drive application.

KIMO developed its own KIMOREG-L device series to supply large inductances (e.g. hoisting solenoids). This permits optimum and fault-proof 4-quadrant DC drive operation for inductances in the Henry range. Further, special equipment was implemented for a broad range of winding drives. As we move into the next millennium, KIMO has a complete portfolio of drive technology, placing the same amount of emphasis on DC as well as AC drives.

KIMO has always focussed on market demands and placed considerable significance on quality assurance long before ISO 9001 had today's significance. KIMO also carried-out in-depth quality tests in its own measuring laboratories.

In order to use state-of-the-art production resources with the best quality, PC boards are produced and the components mounted at a Siemens plant in Erlangen - KIMO then tests the boards themselves.

This cooperation has meant an unbeatable quality standard which is reflected in the returned equipment statistics, which lie far below 1%.

Further, new and ongoing development is extremely important for KIMO. They spend about 10% of their annual DM 14 million turnover on R & D.

The core competence, proven over all of these years is the guarantee for users searching for solutions in all areas of electric drive engineering.

Hardly any of the large companies are able to respond so quickly and agilely to customer-specific requirements as such as a transparent medium-sized company the size and caliber of KIMO.
 

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