Siemens - German Technology that is Taking Over the World

Siemens - German Technology that is Taking Over the World

Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified information on different startups and organizations. The content in this post has been approved by Siemens.

Siemens Limited is a holding company engaged in the manufacturing of electric motors, generators, transformers and electricity distribution, and control apparatus; general purpose machinery, and electrical signalling, safety or traffic-control equipment.

Its segments include Power and Gas, providing solutions for generation of electricity; Energy Management, supplying services for transmission and distribution of electrical energy; Building Technologies, providing buildings and infrastructures; Mobility, supplying solutions for passenger and freight transportation; Digital Factory, including software solutions and automation technologies; Process Industries and Drives, providing solutions and services across life cycles for industry sectors; Healthcare, providing technology for healthcare industry; Metals Technologies, providing metallurgical plant building technology catering services, and design and engineering, and Others, including services provided to group companies and lease rentals.

Siemens - Company Highlights

Startup Name Siemens AG
Headquarters Munich, Germany
Industry Conglomerate
Founder Werner von Siemens, Johann Georg Halske
Founded 1 October 1847
Current CEO Roland Busch (Feb 2021)
Areas served Worldwide
Website www.siemens.com

Siemens - About and How it works?
Siemens - Founder and History
Siemens - Logo and its Meaning
Siemens - Mission
Siemens - Business Model
Siemens - Growth and Revenue
Siemens - Funding And Investors
Siemens - Investments
Siemens - Acquisitions
Siemens - Competitors
Siemens - Challenges Faced
Siemens - Future Plans

Siemens - About and How it works?

Siemens AG is a German multinational conglomerate company headquartered in Munich and the largest industrial manufacturing company in Europe with branch offices abroad.

Siemens multinational company is a global technology powerhouse that brings together the digital and physical worlds to benefit customers and society. The company focuses on intelligent infrastructure for buildings and decentralized energy systems, on automation and digitalization in the process and manufacturing industries, and on smart mobility solutions for rail and road transport.

The principal divisions of the company are Industry, Energy, Healthcare (Siemens Healthineers), and Infrastructure & Cities, which represent the main activities of the company. The company is a prominent maker of medical diagnostics equipment and its medical health-care division, which generates about 12 percent of the company's total sales, is its second-most profitable unit, after the industrial automation division. The company is a component of the Euro Stoxx 50 stock market index. Siemens and its subsidiaries employ approximately 385,000 people worldwide and reported global revenue of around €87 billion in 2019 according to its earnings release.

Siemens - Founder and History

Siemens & Halske was founded by Werner von Siemens and Johann Georg Halske on 1 October 1847.

Founders of Siemens
Founders of Siemens

Based on the telegraph, their invention used a needle to point to the sequence of letters, instead of using Morse code. The company, then called Telegraphen-Bauanstalt von Siemens & Halske, opened its first workshop on 12 October.

In 1848, the company built the first long-distance telegraph line in Europe; 500 km from Berlin to Frankfurt am Main. In 1850, the founder's younger brother, Carl Wilhelm Siemens, later Sir William Siemens, started to represent the company in London. The London agency became a branch office in 1858. In the 1850s, the company was involved in building long-distance telegraph networks in Russia. In 1855, a company branch headed by another brother, Carl Heinrich von Siemens, opened in St Petersburg, Russia. In 1867, Siemens completed the monumental Indo-European telegraph line stretching over 11,000 km from London to Calcutta.

In 1867, Werner von Siemens described a dynamo without permanent magnets. A similar system was also independently invented by Charles Wheatstone, but Siemens became the first company to build such devices. In 1881, a Siemens AC Alternator driven by a watermill was used to power the world's first electric street lighting in the town of Godalming, United Kingdom. The company continued to grow and diversified into electric trains and light bulbs. In 1887, it opened its first office in Japan. In 1890, the founder retired and left the running of the company to his brother Carl and sons Arnold and Wilhelm.


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Company Profile is an initiative by StartupTalky to publish verified informationon different startups and organizations. The content in this post has beenapproved by the organization it is based on. Royal Philips is a leading health technology company focused on improvingpeople’s health and well…

Siemens - Logo and its Meaning

Introduced in 1936, the new logo is executed in a modern yet simple sans-serif typeface, which is very similar to such fonts as Dialogue Pro Extra Bold and Lucida Grande Black.

Logo of Siemens
Logo of Siemens

As for the colour palette of the Siemens visual identity, there are three options of using its logotype: tender and light turquoise, which is the main colour of the brand, evoking a sense of safety, reliability, and calmness; light grey, which stands for confidence and seriousness, and black, which is the colour of power and elegance.

Siemens - Mission

Siemens' mission statement: Responsible: Committed to ethical and responsible actions with respect to legal and ethical standards. Excellent: Achieving high performance and excellent results from ambitious targets derived from vision and verified by benchmarks. Innovative: Being innovative to create sustainable value.

Siemens - Business Model

The Siemens Business model is divided into the following five main sectors and 19 divisions. Briefly, these are:

  • Industry - This sector includes Industry Automation, Drive Technologies and Customer Services divisions.
  • Products and services - Products in this category include building automation equipment and systems, building operations equipment and systems, building fire safety equipment and systems, building security equipment and systems, motors and drives for conveyor belts, pumps and compressors, heavy-duty motors and drivers for rolling steel mills, compressors for oil and gas pipelines, mechanical components, automation equipment and systems for production machinery and tools and industrial plants for water and raw material processing.
  • Energy - This sector includes Fossil Power Generation, Wind Power, Solar and Hydro, Oil and Gas, Energy Service and Power Transmission divisions. The company earned 26.6 billion Euros in Revenue in 2013. At present, it employs about 83,500 employees.
  • Healthcare - This sector includes Imaging and Therapy Systems, Clinical Product, Diagnostics and Customer Solutions divisions. The business unit is based in Erlangen, Germany with regional presence in different areas around the world. The company formally became Siemens Medical Solutions in 2001 and Siemens Healthcare in 2008. The company employs 49,000 employees with a larger concentration based in Germany.
  • Infrastructure and Cities - This sector comprises the Rail Systems, Mobility and Logistics, Low and Medium Voltage, Smart Grid, Building Technologies and OSRAM. This sector works towards solutions for urban mobility, environmental protection and energy conservation. The company employs close to 87,000 employees.

Siemens - Growth and Revenue

Siemens AG revenue for the twelve months ending June 30, 2020 was $80.401B, a 17.09% decline year-over-year.

Year Annual Revenue Percentage change
2019 $98B -0.87%
2018 $98.856B +7.73%
2017 $91.761B +3.87%

Siemens - Funding And Investors

Siemens funding has raised a total of $5.2 Billion in funding over 2 rounds. Their latest funding was raised on Mar 15, 2018 from a Post-IPO Equity round.

Announced Date Round Amount
Mar 15, 2018 Post-IPO Equity - Siemens €4.2B
Jul 19, 2010 Grant - Siemens $8.9M

Siemens - Investments

Siemens has made 24 investments. Their most recent investment was on Apr 28, 2020, when Amply Power raised $13.2 Million.

Date Organization Name Round Amount
Apr 28, 2020 Amply Power Series A $13.2M
Nov 28, 2018 ChargePoint Series H $240M
Jun 11, 2018 Claroty Series B $60M
Jun 1, 2018 ScreenPoint Medical Venture Round €4.3M
May 15, 2018 Northvolt Venture Round €10M
Nov 14, 2017 ubitricity Corporate Round -
Oct 1, 2017 Exchangium Seed Round $900K
Aug 16, 2017 Swinburne University of Technology Grant $135M
Jun 28, 2017 ChargePoint Series G $43M
May 2, 2017 Bonsai Series A $7.6M

Siemens - Acquisitions

The Siemens acquisitions list is long as they have acquired 69 organizations till date. Their most recent acquisition was Abacus Medicine on Jul 15, 2020.

Acquiree Name Date Amount About Aquired Company
Abacus Medicine Jul 15, 2020 - Abacus Medicine is a large and growing business, a company where diversity is treasured
UltraSoC Technologies Jun 24, 2020 - UltraSoC Technologies provides SoC infrastructure to enable rapid development of embedded systems
Controls and Switchgear Ltd. Jan 24, 2020 $297M Controls and Switchgear Ltd. is a producer of electrical power distribution and switching systems
MultiMechanics Nov 15, 2019 - MultiMechanics is a CAE software company
Process Systems Enterprise Sep 16, 2019 - Process Systems Enterprise provides engineering and innovation services to the process industries
ESTEQ Jun 11, 2019 - ESTEQ is a distributor of product lifecycle management, product design and simulation, and manufacturing operations software and services
Mendix Aug 1, 2018 $700M Mendix is the fastest and easiest high-productivity platform to create and continuously improve multi-channel applications at scale
Comfy Jun 26, 2018 - Comfy connects people, places, and systems through one intuitive workplace app
Austemper Design Systems Jun 22, 2018 - Austemper Design Systems is an electronic design automation tools company that provides a comprehensive tool-suite
J2 Innovations May 17, 2018 - J2 Innovations is the creator of FIN Framework, an advanced, open, customizable software platform for building automation & IoT applications

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Siemens - Competitors

Siemens's top competitors include Schneider Electric, ABB, General Electric, Toshiba, Bosch, BHEL, Mitsubishi Electric and Philips.

Siemens - Challenges Faced

  • A big issue was initially Siemens had Group Presidents that were also members of the overall firm’s managing board, which can present a conflict of interest. It is not customary for firms to have members of the board that are also sitting in positions of power within the company. It can make it difficult to be able to provide an un-bias opinion on controversial issues or decisions to be made at a corporate level.
  • There seemed to be a lack of structure within the corporate departments within the company. There were far too many groups and sub-groups in the corporate centre. There were five corporate centres, as well as five sub-corporate centres. This is seemingly an excessive number of departments within departments that can cause immense communication disconnects.
  • Siemens profit was stagnant for a period, despite a significant increase in sales. This was a major concern of shareholders. There is usually a problem if a business plan consists of improvements in sales, but not much improvement in profit over a prolonged period of time.
  • The top+program, while effective, was still missing something to help with the corporate environment of Siemens. Siemens still had somewhat of an unstable environment as a whole on the corporate level. Although the top+ program was implemented, there still were gaps in which Siemens could improve.
  • A more inclusive program needed to be developed, to still include the initial base of top but also detailing additional necessary strategies. This was part of Siemens’ projected plans throughout the 10-year period. However, many of the developed programs did not succeed as the initial program did. Therefore, they were constantly changing and not providing a stable plan for the company.

Bosch | German Multinational Company | Company Profile |
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Siemens - Future Plans

When you think of a German multinational engineering and electronics conglomerate company, you immediately think of Siemens. The company decided to enhance its capability to respond rapidly to the increasing number, scale and complexity of Internet threats. This was also an opportunity to simplify its network and security operations to enable faster and more effective response management.

They have set 7 goals for the implementation of Vision 2020+.

  • Grow company value
  • Sharpen business focus Electrification, Automation and Digitalization
  • Be a partner of choice for our customers
  • Get closer to our markets
  • Live lean governance and drive continuous optimization
  • Be an employer of choice
  • Ignite pride and passion for Siemens through Ownership Culture

Frequently Asked Questions - FAQs

Is Siemens a British company?

No, Siemens is a German company, headquartered in Munich.

What does Siemens company do?

Siemens is a conglomerate company which deals with anything from power generation, transmission and distribution to smart grid solutions and the efficient application of electrical energy to areas of medical imaging and laboratory diagnostics.

What does Siemens AG stand for?

Siemens AG stands for Siemens Aktiengesellschaft.

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