Koenig und Bauer - Firmengeschichte und beteiligte Personen

Koenig & Bauer AG (; ) is a German company that makes

printing press A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium (such as paper or cloth), thereby transferring the ink. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in which the ...

es based in

Würzburg Würzburg (; Main-Franconian: ) is a city in the region of Franconia in the north of the German state of Bavaria. Würzburg is the administrative seat of the '' Regierungsbezirk'' Lower Franconia. It spans the banks of the Main River. Würzbur ...

. It was founded by

Friedrich Koenig Friedrich Gottlob Koenig (17 April 1774 – 17 January 1833) was a German inventor best known for his high-speed steam-powered printing press, which he built together with watchmaker Andreas Friedrich Bauer. This new style of printing press ...

and

Andreas Friedrich Bauer Andreas Friedrich Bauer (18 August 1783 – 27 December 1860) was a German engineer who developed the first functional steam-powered printing press with his colleague Friedrich Koenig, who had invented the technology and sold it to ''The Times'' ...

in Würzburg in 1817, making it the oldest printing press manufacturer in the world still in service. 95% of the banknotes used in the world are printed on printers made by Koenig & Bauer Banknote Solutions SA, a division of Koenig & Bauer.

History

Founded in 1817, by the 20th century Koenig and Bauer had become a major company and the world's leading manufacturer of security printing equipment. In 1951, the firm began to suffer from the age of the designs of the machines it was selling, some of which dated from the early 1920s, and its chairman, Hans Bolza, faced up to the need to come to terms with

Gualtiero Giori Gualtiero "Rino" Giori (1913–1992) was an Italian security printer and inventor who founded the company Giori SA in 1951. Life Giori came from a family of security printers. In 1876, his grandfather had bought a printing company in Milan and h ...

, an Italian printer and inventor with a company in

Lausanne Lausanne ( , , , ) ; it, Losanna; rm, Losanna. is the capital and largest city of the Swiss French speaking canton of Vaud. It is a hilly city situated on the shores of Lake Geneva, about halfway between the Jura Mountains and the Alps, and fac ...

who had made great advances in intaglio printing. Bolza established an immediate rapport with Giori, and the deal they signed in 1952 led to a long-term agreement in 1958. Koenig & Bauer surrendered to Giori its distribution rights, even in Germany, but gained the exclusive rights to manufacture Giori machines, and the two had a long and profitable association. In 2001, after Giori's death, Koenig & Bauer acquired his company, Giori SA, part of which was renamed KBA Giori

Printing capacity

The table lists the maximum number of pages which the various early 19th-century press designs of Friedrich Koenig and Andreas Bauer could print ''per hour'', compared to earlier hand-operated screw presses. The table includes those designs which were constructed by the pair in

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

before the establishment of their company upon their return to Germany.

Notes

References

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External links

Official Koenig & Bauer website
* Companies based in Bavaria Würzburg Printing press manufacturers Manufacturing companies established in 1817 German brands {{manufacturing-company-stub