Messer publishes 44 years of economic history

Family-owned industrial gas specialist Messer has now posted its complete Company Reports
for the past 44 years on its website, offering readers an insight into the strategic operations of the company in recent history.

The results are published complete with individual perspectives – for each year, historian and author Jörg Leszenski has written informative German sketches of the industrial setting, providing a unique and independent view of the company’s history.

Since 2004, Messer has been owner-managed, with Stefan Messer as Chairman of the Board. From 1965 to 2001, Messer (at that time a subsidiary of Hoechst AG) operated under the name Messer Griesheim.

It is only against the background of the overall economic conditions that the special features of Messer’s history become clear. The texts, read in parallel with one another, offer intriguing insights into the strategies adopted by the company to take advantage of its market opportunities at those moment.

This is especially intesting given the ever-changing world economy since the end of the 1960s, while this recollection of figures also provides a glimpse into the rash expansion strategies which drove Messer to the brink of ruin in the 1990s.

The history of the family firm, now 111 years old, has always been closely intertwined with the overall economic development of its core markets and the sector-specific economic cycles in the chemicals and mechanical engineering industries.

The Company Reports archived from 1966 to present day and the reports on the economic setting reflect both the economic cycles, and the growing global interdependence of national economies. While also documenting the rise of new ‘boom’ regions, the publishing of such records demonstrates Messer’s eagerness to learn from the past, and build for the future.

Get a further insight into the developments, strategies and future plans of the Messer Group, as gasworld speaks exclusively with CEO Stefan Messer – in the forthcoming June issue of gasworld magazine.