“We want to be perceived as a relevant valve manufacturer in the market overall”

In this interview, Andreas Laschke, the new President Valves at KSB, talks about the strategic realignment of the company with a focus on the valves business, digitalization and international expansion. Key topics are the positioning in the hydrogen market, the expansion of customer proximity and the goal of establishing KSB globally as a leading solution provider in the field of industrial valves.

Mr. Laschke, 2024 was an absolute record year for KSB - how do you assess this result against the backdrop of the current challenging global economic situation?

Andreas Laschke: The uncertainties in 2025 have certainly increased compared to 2024 and the consequences of the current upheavals in global trade can only be guessed at. Nevertheless, opportunities can already be identified. Take South Korea, for example: in the marine business, there are already positive trends in shipbuilding due to the relocation of Western demand to Korea. With a valve plant and an agile sales organization, we are well prepared for this development. Take India, for example: KSB has been producing pumps and valves here for decades. The experience we have built up in the export business in recent years and the quality promise “Made by KSB” will also position us excellently in international trade in the future if companies want to diversify their procurement. All in all, we will have to see what framework conditions emerge for our 2025 financial year compared to 2024.

In your opinion, what factors were decisive for this extraordinary success - innovation, market presence or internal restructuring?

First of all, I would like to emphasize that it was not an “extraordinary” success. If you look at the key figures such as incoming orders, sales or results in recent years, we have continuously increased these. The basis for this is a clear strategy which, in addition to the dimensions you mentioned, also includes other elements such as technology and quality leadership. This strategy is described in clearly defined measures and key figures up to 2030. This creates focus and commitment. Overall, we want to achieve a return on sales of over 10 percent and incoming orders of over 4 billion euros by 2030.

Looking ahead to 2025: KSB wants to focus more on the valves business. What are the key strategic goals here and how are they to be achieved?

Let me start with a goal that seems relatively trivial: To get the message across to the markets that KSB is a relevant valves company in the global market. For many market players, KSB still stands for “pump and associated service”. Even in the German market, where we have a really high market penetration, I still hear people say: “I didn't even know that KSB also produces valves.”

In addition to marketing and communication measures with which we want to change this image and also leverage synergies between pumps and valves, we have of course set ourselves many more goals. In markets where we are already well represented, we want to increase our application expertise and offer our customers a suitable portfolio for their specific processes. In other markets, we will initially expand our sales network in order to be close to our customers with valve specialists. Because despite the best technology and a global network, I still see customer proximity as an important success factor. This then continues in product provision. Here we need to be closer to the markets and shorten our delivery times through localization.

You have recently been appointed President Valves at the KSB Group. What excites you most about this new role - and what priorities would you like to set?

I am particularly excited by the opportunity to shape the valve business holistically. We are also at an important transition point with our valves organization. We have some very successful, locally agile and technologically leading units in our group. Internationalizing their business and combining it into a globally available portfolio is one of our top priorities.

What changes are you introducing in the organization or in the product portfolio of the fittings division?

The application orientation I mentioned earlier will also be reflected in the organization and the further development of our product portfolio. Incidentally, I prefer to refer to the latter as a “solution portfolio”. In many markets, it is no longer just the physical product, i.e. the hardware and technology, that is important to customers. Processing expertise, particularly with regard to customized documentation, is almost as important. In other areas, the provision of digital data for planning and subsequent operational monitoring plays an important role. Overall, we will therefore ask ourselves much more strongly in future where the customer benefits of our services lie and align our activities more closely with this in terms of organization and range of services.

With your new role as Deputy Chairman of the Industrial Valves Division at the VDMA, you are also taking on an important industry function. How do you intend to use this position to advance the industry?

The speed and sweeping nature with which new requirements and regulations are currently being imposed on industrial companies from Berlin and Brussels represent a major challenge for the entire industry. On the VDMA Executive Board for both industrial and building services valves, we have therefore defined early involvement in the political and regulatory decision-making processes as our top priority. This is NOT about maintaining the status quo. Of course, we also take care of the major socio-political challenges such as environmental protection, for example through the appropriate use of materials or recycling and take-back processes. We are even driving these forward, as with energy security, by providing more efficient and intelligent solutions. However, we must ensure that the relevant information is included in the decision-making processes.

In addition to the regulatory focus, there are also a number of other topics. These include innovation management and corporate social responsibility issues, for which we, as a large company, have already implemented many solutions. Here we can advance the industry quickly and purposefully by exchanging experiences in the various VDMA committees.

What synergies do you see between your work at KSB and your role at the VDMA - particularly with regard to technical standards, sustainability or innovation?

As an international company, we are represented in many specific committees and transnational standards committees in Europe, but also worldwide. This enables us to identify trends in these areas at a very early stage and incorporate them into the VDMA's work on these issues.

Take the “product carbon footprint”, for example - driven by much stricter requirements in France, we built up expertise in this area very early on, which we are now rolling out worldwide within KSB. This year, we initiated a working group on this topic within the VDMA in order to define a standardized approach for the industry and also provide smaller companies with a “toolbox”. Take “innovation management”, for example - we are contributing our own experts to the VDMA, but also benefiting from the market observation methods and tools that the VDMA has developed in recent years.

The hydrogen market is an increasingly important field. What role does KSB currently play in this future-oriented area, and what potential do you see for your company in the medium term?

This topic is a strategic focus at KSB, both in the pump and valve sectors. Through targeted participation in specialist conferences and trade fairs, we are positioning ourselves in this market as a supplier that can serve a large process area with a broad product portfolio in the field of hydrogen electrolysis, for example. Our portfolio also covers the development of systems for larger quantities / nominal diameters and pressure ranges. In the meantime, this market not only represents potential for us, but we are already supplying specific projects, for example in the field of alkaline electrolysis with our lined diaphragm valves or in the field of gas separation with our butterfly valves.

In your opinion, what are the biggest challenges for valve manufacturers in the context of the energy transition - and how is KSB meeting these challenges?

In my view, the biggest challenge is predicting the overall future scenario and aligning capacities accordingly. While we are definitely seeing a trend towards a decentralized energy supply and technologies such as wind and solar energy with a significantly lower demand for high-performance valves, conventional energy generation is being expanded even further in China and India. With the so-called “Small Modular Reactors”, new technologies in the field of nuclear power generation are coming our way. There will continue to be demand for renewals and spare parts from conventional energy applications. At KSB, we handle this wide range of applications by standardizing technologies and processes and by making qualifications and capacities more flexible.

Technologically, we are preparing for the new scenarios. In the area of decentralized energy supply, a wide variety of local configurations consisting of energy generators, consumers, storage and feed-in will emerge. Their efficiency can be increased through increased monitoring and control. We are currently launching the platforms in the field of measurement and control technology on the market and will continue to expand them. In the area of central/large power plants, we are gearing our materials and designs towards the higher demands of alternating operation.

How does KSB position itself in international competition - especially against suppliers from Asia or North America?

We are part of the international competition. As far as our activities and production facilities in Europe are concerned, we are geared towards the flexible and rapid fulfillment of specific customer requirements of our European customers. The bundling and provision of various technologies, including documentation and in-process activities, are also services that we can provide better within our market and that differentiate us from external competition. In contrast, we serve standard requirements in price-driven market segments from our Asian production facilities with the quality promise “Made by KSB”.

We are also increasingly internationalizing our production facilities in India and China, which for a long time were geared towards the domestic market. With our high-pressure valves and gate valves as well as control valves from India, we have just successfully supplied the power generation for one of the largest investments in a chemical plant in Europe. When it comes to competitors from North America regarding ASME standards in Europe, we are very competitive due to our very strong distribution network in Europe and the excellent quality from Asia.

Digitalization and smart valves are a much-discussed topic - what developments can we expect from KSB in this area?

We see great potential in the combination of measurement and control technology for building services engineering and general industrial applications. Our new products and platforms, BOA-SYSTRONIC ePIC and BOATRONIC MOD and MP, which we have just presented at the ISH, combine non-contact heat quantity measurement using ultrasound with a control unit. They can be combined with any fitting and can be used for fine control. We will continue to expand these platforms and develop them for further application scenarios.

For our high-performance valves, we tend to rely on sensor technology that enables early wear detection by combining operating data and wear models from historical data. Such solutions are already being used for our diaphragm valves for sterile technology. We have been gathering operating experience in this area for years.

In these areas, we benefit from the fact that KSB has been driving forward developments in the field of digitalization, data processing and sensor technology for pumps for many years. Platforms for data processing or communication with digital solutions in the form of apps are therefore already very mature and we can use them together.

Finally, what is your personal vision for the KSB Group's valve business over the next five years?

An important point for me is that we are perceived as a relevant valve manufacturer not only in individual applications, but in the market as a whole. This requires a certain size and means significant growth. At the same time, we want to make a significant contribution to the KSB Group's returns. In the very price-driven valve market, we will achieve this if we exploit all our synergies and position ourselves as a quality provider with a relevant solution portfolio in individual focus applications.