The acquisition of Robicon Corporation will give Siemens added strength in drives technology. Robicon, with headquarters in New Kensington, Pennsylvania, USA, is a leading manufacturer of medium-voltage converters for AC motors and currently employs around 470 staff worldwide. The company with a production plant in New Kensington as well as subsidiaries in Shanghai (China), High Wycombe (Great Britain), Sao Paulo (Brazil) and Edmonton (Canada) achieved sales of 117 million US dollars in 2004. A purchase price of 184 million US dollars was agreed upon with the trustee, appointed by court as required by Chapter 11 of the American bankruptcy law. The U.S. district court of Massachusetts in Boston has approved the sale on June 30th. The transaction has already received antitrust clearance from responsible antitrust authorities.

Drive technology is a strategic business activity of the Siemens Automation and Drives (A&D) Group with high growth potential. A&D President Helmut Gierse commented: "The planned acquisition of the Robicon activities will enable us to continue our expansion in the field of industrial drives. Seen both from a technological and regional viewpoint, this purchase provides an ideal added expansion for us. The acquisition will also improve market access to important customers and thus contribute to our efforts to achieve profit oriented growth." Robicon is active in particular in the key sectors of oil and gas, water/waste water and energy, whereby A&D will obtain additional access to the market for its own products. The world market for drives has a volume of 25 billion euros with an annual growth rate of around 2.5 percent.

Siemens intends to operate the Robicon activities from its location in New Kensington, Pennsylvania, USA - with worldwide responsibility for development, production and marketing. The new business will be assigned to the A&D Large Drives Division as a separate subdivision and, from a company law point of view, incorporated into the Regional Company Siemens Energy & Automation, Atlanta, Georgia, USA. The international subsidiaries of Robicon shall be integrated into the existing Siemens regional companies.

The Siemens Automation and Drives (A&D) Group, Nuremberg, is the world's leading manufacturer in the field of automation and drives. Products supplied by A&D include standard products for the manufacturing and process industries and for the electrical installation industry as well as system solutions, for example for machine tools, and solutions for whole industries such as the automation of entire automobile factories or chemical plants. Supplementing this range of products and services, A&D also offers software for linking production and management (horizontal and vertical IT integration), as well as for optimizing production processes. A&D employs 51,800 people worldwide and in fiscal year 2004 (to September 30) earned a pre-tax profit of €1.077 billion on sales of €8.829 billion and orders of €8.98 billion.