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Family business with tradition: Fronius celebrates its seventy-fifth birthday

By Fronius UK on

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What began in 1945 as a one-man business based on a simple idea is now part of the industrial landscape: we’re talking about the Austrian family-owned company Fronius, which has grown over the past three quarters of a century from a regional repair shop to a global player in the fields of welding technology, photovoltaics, and battery charging technology. And it all started exactly 75 years ago on June 20.

In 1945, Günter Fronius laid the foundations for Fronius International GmbH, which today ranks among the world’s leading innovators in the fields of welding technology, photovoltaics, and battery charging technology.

Günter Fronius set the ball rolling in 1945 when he started a radio and electrical repair workshop, beginning a story of success that continues to this under the stewardship of the third generation of the founding family. The business was born in the market town of Pettenbach, Upper Austria, where Fronius’s headquarters are still located. This is where Günter Fronius lived and worked after being given an old military barracks in exchange for carrying out some repair work. In those days, charging vehicle batteries was not a simple matter – something which he felt ought to change. A trained electrical engineer, he developed a solution which meant that batteries could be used for longer. “So what we are and what we stand for is based on a sustainable idea that my grandfather had,” says Fronius CEO Elisabeth Engelbrechtsmüller-Strauß, who has been managing the family business since 2012.

Fronius Transarc 500: the world’s first transistor-based primary switched inverter welding system.

The welding revolution, globalization, and solar power

In 1950, Günter Fronius expanded the company’s product range to include welding transformers. Building on this technological basis, over the following decades Fronius grew into a substantial medium-sized company, which the electrical engineer handed over to his children, Brigitte Strauss and Klaus Fronius, in 1980. They launched a program of growth and international expansion that led to the founding of subsidiaries all over the world. In 1992, it was also decided to focus on solar energy as a “technology of the future”. And so, today, Fronius stands on three pillars: welding technology, photovoltaics, and battery charging technology.

From the archive: one of the first battery chargers.
From the archive: one of the first battery chargers.

Business Unit Perfect Charging

The Business Unit Perfect Charging is as old as the firm itself. Company founder Günter Fronius started charging lead accumulator batteries in the early years of the business. After numerous further developments, in the early 1990s the company switched from 50 Hz chargers to high-frequency technology for the first time. Further research lead to a real milestone in 2007 – the Ri charging process which charges the battery according to its effective inner resistance. Since then, Fronius products have automatically adapted themselves to the batteries being charged and their properties, making every charge unique. Perfect Charging is currently taking the next step into the future with lithium-ion technology, incorporating new ideas about digitalization and device networking.

Fronius Sunrise: the first inverter.

Business Unit Perfect Welding

The Business Unit Perfect Welding has been in existence since 1950, when company founder Günter Fronius discovered that he could melt a rod electrode with the technology used in the battery chargers. Research made great progress in the mid-1970s, culminating in a real revolution with the Fronius Transarc 500. This was the world’s first transistor-based primary switched inverter welding system, and Fronius suddenly gained major partners outside Austria. In 1998 the Transarc was replaced by the digital TransPuls Synergic (TPS), the first welding system capable of being updated. At the time, the company was also researching a new type of welding process, which would go down in history under the name of “cold metal transfer” (CMT) in 2005. Since then, it has been possible to join extremely thin materials, as well as materials such as aluminum and steel. Today, Fronius is setting a new trend with TPS/i (Trans Process Solution / intelligent revolution). This high-performance welding computer is the company’s answer to Industry 4.0 and comes into its own when used in conjunction with the data management system provided by the WeldCube Premium software solution.

Business Unit Solar Energy

The Business Unit Solar Energy has been part of Fronius since 1992. The Fronius Sunrise inverter was launched on the market in 1995 and achieved international success within a very short time. A genuine revolution came about in 2001 with the launch of Fronius IG. This was the first inverter with a high-frequency transformer, which allows technicians to replace the PC board on site. In recent years, the business has developed from a pure inverter manufacturer to becoming a provider of solutions for the efficient and intelligent generation, storage, distribution, and consumption of energy. The product range extends from tailor-made storage solutions to photovoltaics for water heating and solar e-mobility, hydrogen production and storage, and H2 refueling infrastructure. Next step: the Fronius portfolio will soon be extended to include the Symo GEN24 Plus three-phase hybrid inverter, an all-in-one solution for comprehensive solar self-sufficiency.

Fronius UK

Fronius UK, a subsidiary of Fronius International, provides the UK welding market with solutions for MIG/MAG, TIG, electrode, laser, plasma and resistance spot welding and automation. Its new state-of-the-art facility in Milton Keynes extends over 30,000m2 and houses the Tech Support team, the Repair Center, a warehouse and a training area and epitomises the importance of being able to deliver a first-class service to customers.

Visit our website 01908 512 300

Fronius UK, a subsidiary of Fronius International, provides the UK welding market with solutions for MIG/MAG, TIG, electrode, laser, plasma and resistance spot welding and automation. Its new state-of-the-art facility in Milton Keynes extends over 30,000m2 and houses the Tech Support team, the Repair Center, a warehouse and a training area and epitomises the importance of being able to deliver a first-class service to customers.

Sales and service teams, both at head office and regionally, ensure that customers are supported as quickly as possible on their own premises. In addition, customers benefit from services such as calibration, a warranty extension and a maintenance contract.

For decades, Fronius has made significant contributions to advances in welding technology. The company is still in family ownership and its welding technology division is now one of the world’s technology leaders in the arc welding market segment. It is also the market leader in Europe.

Welding Technology is one of three Fronius divisions. Since the 1940s, Fronius has been creating technologies and solutions for monitoring and controlling energy in battery-charging systems, and since 1992 the same in solar electronics. The mains-connected inverter, the unique Fronius Service Partner programme and products for monitoring photovoltaic systems make Fronius one of the leading suppliers in the field of solar electronics.

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