The German Machine Tool Industry

With some 64,000 employees and a production volume of almost 12.7 billion euros in 2021, the German machine tool industry ranks among the five largest specialist groupings in the mechanical engineering sector. Although it thus constitutes only a comparatively small branch of industry, it plays an important role for macro-economic development worldwide. It supplies production technology for metalworking applications in all sectors, and makes a crucial contribution towards innovation and productivity enhancement in the industrial sector. The success of the machine tool industry is thus an important indicator for the dynamism and performative capabilities of the German economy, an indispensable motor for cyclical development and a significant driver of progress and technical innovation.

On an international comparison, too, both for production output and for exports, the German machine tool industry has for decades now been up with the front-runners. With a global market share of 13.4 per cent, in 2021 Germany was in third place behind China and Japan. 64 per cent of the production output, worth approximately 8.1 billion euros, was sold abroad.

The sector owes its performative capabilities not least to the decisiveness and flexibility of mid-tier entrepreneurs. Just over a tenth of the manufacturers have more than 1,000 employees, and around 51 per cent of the companies involved have a payroll of less than 250.