EPLAN Celebrates 40 Years – from Startup to Market Leader
Company anniversary
Prof. Friedhelm Loh, owner and CEO of the Friedhelm Loh Group: “We are celebrating a major company success with this fortieth anniversary. Today, EPLAN software is the software standard across industries. By combining software and hardware expertise within the group of companies, we create unique added value on the market.”
It was a truly groundbreaking achievement when this electrical engineering software was launched in 1984. It was called EPLAN, then became the name for the company a short time later, and it revolutionised the working world for technical draughtsmen. Paper and ink were traded for the screen of a personal computer. Nowadays it is almost impossible to imagine electrical engineering without EPLAN. EPLAN, the market leader, continues to revolutionise the planning processes for design engineers in many industries with the digital twin, cloud-based services and ever-increasing data consistency. This was recently celebrated with an anniversary event at the National Automobile Museum – The Loh Collection.
When the first personal computers came onto the market in the early 1980s, Winfried Müller, a creative engineer, ventured an experiment: creating schematics with standard and therefore relatively inexpensive software. It was a revolution! What started with a simple idea marked the birth of a global software standard, the founding of EPLAN – and the start of a success story. Early on, Prof. Friedhelm Loh recognised the great potential of this idea and, in 1986, invested in the software start-up – a forward-looking decision as would later become clear.
A passion for innovation
Much has happened since that time. EPLAN has played a key role in driving and shaping digitalisation in electrical engineering design. From preplanning to electrical and fluid-power system designs to the engineering of control cabinets, switchgear systems and wire harnesses, the EPLAN Platform is used all around the world in twenty different languages. EPLAN solutions are used across the board in various ecosystems – throughout machine and plant system engineering, throughout the automotive industry and its suppliers, as part of the energy sector and building technology, and in control cabinet and switchgear system engineering and manufacturing. The digital twin, which users can create using EPLAN solutions, is indispensable today. Using this as a foundation, it helps to advance partially or fully automated processes in engineering and manufacturing for more efficiency along the entire value chain. It also helps counteract the problematic shortage of skilled workers. In addition, increasing numbers of cloud-based software and services are finding their way into engineering. Digital, consistent and end-to-end data creates the basis for “efficient engineering,” EPLAN’s corporate slogan.
Rittal and Rittal Software Systems CEO Markus Asch (second from left): “The interaction of hardware and software based on consistent, end-to-end digital data creates real value for our customers. They can make all of their processes more efficient and productive. This creates a decisive competitive advantage for our clients and is what we strive for every day.”
EPLAN CEO Sebastian Seitz (second from right): “From the very beginning, we were driven by the passion for innovation and working with people. Inventing new things, making solutions better and staying ahead in the game – that has always been coded within EPLAN’s DNA and is the recipe for success moving forward.”
EPLAN Managing Director Haluk Menderes (at right)
From Monheim, Germany into the world
Now with 68,000 customers, 274,000 licences and 50 locations around the globe, the company EPLAN has become a true global player. It is part of Rittal Software Systems within the Friedhelm Loh Group that is active worldwide. “From the very beginning, we were driven by the passion for innovation and working with people. Inventing new things, making solutions better and staying ahead in the game – that has always been coded within EPLAN’s DNA and is the recipe for success moving forward,” said EPLAN CEO Sebastian Seitz at the anniversary celebration in the National Automobile Museum. His enthusiasm was palpable as he continued: “Developing software that is there for people, making their daily work easier, and that is fun to use – that’s what drives us every day. We’re thankful that customers have become real fans who are enthusiastic about our solutions. Today and in the future, the collaboration between EPLAN and Rittal continues to open up new perspectives for the group of companies.”
For Rittal International and Rittal Software Systems CEO Markus Asch, the focus is on this potential: “The interaction of hardware and software based on consistent, end-to-end digital data creates real value for our customers. They can make all of their processes more efficient and productive. This creates a decisive competitive advantage for our clients and is what we strive for every day.”
Global standard and industry role model
Prof. Friedhelm Loh, owner and CEO of the Friedhelm Loh Group, honored the company’s courage to always forge its own path and to think and do thing differently than others. In this day and age, this is extraordinary and a role model for the entire industry: “We are celebrating a major company success with this fortieth anniversary. Today, EPLAN software is the software standard across industries. By combining software and hardware expertise within the group of companies, we create unique added value on the market. Right now it is important to keep up the pace and continue assisting our customers in advancing the digitalisation of their processes. That is what drives us and remains our promise now and in the future. We would like to thank our customers for their trust and partnership, and all of our employees at EPLAN who help make it possible.”
In closing, Sebastian Seitz said, “We’re delighted about the story of forty years of success at EPLAN, which we have been able to write with our team and EPLAN’s own company spirit. Our story is far from over, and I’m thrilled to be a part of its continuation.”
