Despite the weak construction sector, Poloplast Kunststoffwerk GmbH & Co KG (A-4060 Leonding; www.poloplast.at) succeeded in stepping up both its sales and result in 2002. Sales at the company, which produces plastic pipes and has 168 employees, were up at EUR 36m (34m). Profits on ordinary activities rose to EUR 3.6m (2.6m), giving a capital-return margin of 14%. Managing director Guntram Bock attributes this to the company´s niche-product strategy. Poloplast was thus able to increase sales of its “Polo Eco plus” multi- layer sewage pipe system, despite Austrian local authorities cutting back on their investment in municipal water engineering. As a consequence, the company´s share in its home- market sewage pipe sector rose to 35%, says Bock.

Poloplast belongs to Knoch, Kern & Co KG (A-9020 Klagenfurt), a 100%-family-owned company known as the Wietersdorfer Group, which specialises in cement, building materials and pipes and has overall sales in excess of EUR 215m. It operates a 50:50 JV with the Hobas Group (CH-4617 Gunzgen; www.hobas.com) which includes two engineering companies, as well as production facilities in Austria, the Czech Republic, Switzerland, the US and Germany. Poloplast´s sister company is specialised in pipe systems made of glass fibre reinforced plastics.

Apart from Austria, Poloplast also supplies the other EU countries and acceding states. Its current export ratio is 34%, which marks an increase of around 5%. The company is especially targeting the “difficult German market” and, in July 2002, acquired the joint parent company´s 75% share in Polymelt Kunststofftechnik GmbH (D-87640 Ebenhofen; www.polymelt.de) to this end. Polymelt posted sales of some EUR 14m in 2002 with its 85 employees. The company has been operating as Poloplast Germany since 1 January 2003.