3 days Open House - the Soraluce Summit 2022
From May 18 to 20, Soraluce once again invited guests to its headquarters and five plants in Bergara, Northern Spain. 350 international guests were shown and explained the latest developments during guided tours.
It was a delight to see the interest of our guests and to show and explain to them every detail of the machines and their production during the tours. But not only that: The Summit was also the perfect setting to celebrate Soraluce’s 60th anniversary. Thilo Borbonus summed it up nicely: “Bimatec and Soraluce are one family. We look back with gratitude on the milestones of the last six decades and look forward to setting new impulses for the future together.”
So what was it like at this Summit? In short: “International, focused and with a positive vibe.” In the buses that drove the groups to the respective next program points and the evening event, one could hear almost every European language.
There were married couples, father-son teams, managing director-production manager teams and entire groups from one company. Some of the guests were already familiar from the last Summit 2019. The atmosphere was relaxed and interested: Although the program with its tours of five plants and the headquarters plus the Ideko Research and Development Center, Goimek and the Machine Tool Museum was quite demanding, there was no one among the guests who wanted to leave the group. Consistently questions were asked, machines touched, surfaces examined, notes taken and discoveries shown to each other.
And there was plenty to see: From the receipt of the raw materials to the machining of the machine beds, parts production and pre-assembly to the design and assembly of the milling heads, the entire creation of a machine was made comprehensible. Always accompanied by the pride of the colleagues in the technology and their work – in the case of the cooperatively organized company, “their work” can even be taken literally.
During the tours, however, details of our working principles and company management were also able to inspire: At Soraluce, working economically does not simply mean cutting expenses, but on the contrary investing in intelligent processes and providing well-organized, ergonomic workstations. We have been able to demonstrate this with the standard tool trolleys and the portable workstations for programmers, as well as with the “one man-one head” principle. Example: Each production step in milling head assembly is assigned to a specific employee who takes responsibility for assembling our milling heads.
After the plants, there was another very special little gem to discover: With the visit of the historical museum Lagunak, the guests received a very vivid insight into the development of northern Spanish mechanical engineering: first lathes, a reconstructed forge and the connections between armament orders, industry and the founding of cities.
In the evening, it was time to let the Basque passion for cooking and eating together come alive and toast to 60 years of Soraluce together with the guests in the old town of San Sebastian. Food and wine were delicious and there was an interesting interaction instead of small talk and so a nice, interesting and bonding summit came to an end.