Heidelberger Druckmaschinen AG (Heidelberg) has outlined its growth strategy as the company enters a milestone year in 2025.

March 11, 2025, will mark the 175th anniversary of the founding of Heidelberg, when it began as a bell foundry in Frankenthal in the Palatinate region of Germany.

According to the company, it sees growth potential of more than €300 million in sales for all strategic initiatives by the 2028/2029 financial year, while at the same time consolidating performance and increasing efficiency.

“To expand our market position, we are increasingly tapping into growth potential in our core business in packaging and digital printing as well as in the software and lifecycle business,” said Jürgen Otto, CEO of Heidelberg.  

“We will also continue to expand our offering in the growing green technologies market. This includes key areas such as high-precision mechanical engineering, the automotive industry, charging infrastructure and software, and new hydrogen technologies.”

Heidelberg said it is benefiting from the constantly growing global demand for packaging. The end customer market for packaging has grown by more than 60 per cent worldwide over the past 10 years.

In cooperation with Solenis, Heidelberg is responding to the global trend away from plastic and foil towards paper-based packaging and will in future offer solutions for printing recyclable packaging, particularly for the food industry.

The company already generates more than 50 per cent of its turnover in the packaging segment, and the trend is clearly upward.

According to market estimates, the global digital printing market accessible to Heidelberg including service and consumables, will grow from around €5 billion today to €7.5 billion by 2029. Heidelberg has significantly expanded its offering, including through its cooperation with Canon. This will significantly increase sales of digital printing solutions. Incoming orders already confirm this from the next financial year.

Heidelberg also sees a lever for more sales growth in its strong international presence in around 170 countries worldwide. The company will continue to expand this internationalisation, particularly in growth markets such as Asia, the USA, and emerging markets.

Another focus is on Heidelberg’s industrial business to open up new product areas, markets, and industries. The company said it already has extensive skills, expertise, and resources that are currently already being used outside the printing industry, particularly in the fields of high-precision mechanical engineering, the automotive industry, electromobility and hydrogen.

The company is also increasingly offering its expertise and installed capacities to other companies in order to efficiently industrialise or manufacture their products.

“175 years of Heidelberger Druckmaschinen are a strong testimony to consistency, as well as innovative strength and thus future viability,” said Otto.

“Thanks to its impressive achievements over the past 175 years, the company is looking forward to further growth in the coming years with its current market position, the expertise of its employees and global customer relationships.”

Together with customers, employees and partners, Heidelberg will celebrate its anniversary year with numerous events and activities. In the summer, for example, there will be a week of celebrations at the Wiesloch-Walldorf headquarters in the newly designed demonstration center – the Home of Print – including an anniversary ceremony with guests from all over the world. Family days are planned for employees at individual locations. In addition, there will be an anniversary magazine in which the history of the company will be presented, and the future will be directed.

“Our history impressively demonstrates how entrepreneurship, technical expertise and the genuine creative power of our employees can have a lasting impact on a company over such a long period of time and, far beyond that, on an entire industry to this day,” said Otto.

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