Rittal celebrates the one millionth VX25 – and its employees

07.10.2021. The year 2021 is a triple milestone for Rittal. The company is celebrating the 60th anniversary of its founding, the 75th birthday of owner Prof. Friedhelm Loh, and now also the VX25. On 16th August, the one millionth enclosure rolled off the production line. Special thanks are here due to the 1,240 employees at the Rittershausen location. The owner and representatives of company management now honoured their achievement at a commemorative ceremony – on the very same production floor where the VX25 is being manufactured day after day.

How can we make the best even better? That was the question which Rittal asked itself as the starting point for development of the enclosure system VX25. Today, three years after the initial market launch, the VX25 is already in use with industrial and IT customers all over the world: In the production centres of all major automobile manufacturers, for example, as well as in wind turbines at some of the most remote locations, on cruise liners, and in the data centres of IT giants such as Facebook and Amazon. The one millionth VX25, which rolled off the production line on 16th August 2021, has been gilded to mark the occasion and was celebrated with music and confetti by management and employees at the Rittershausen location. It was a memorable and at the same time festive moment when the extraordinary achievements of so many Rittal employees – design engineers, product managers and production technicians – were honoured in person.

“This was all only possible with your contributions. For that, I cannot thank you enough. We have always been the global technology leader, and the VX25 enclosure has sent out yet another signal to the world market. Our customers were absolutely astounded. And we have now been demonstrating excellence in enclosure manufacturing over four product generations,” Prof. Friedhelm Loh told the employees attending the ceremony.

Incredible! – that is how the owner and chairman of the Friedhelm Loh Group described the Rittal success story. He recalled that Rittershausen was not only the birthplace of the large enclosures, but also the cradle of the company as a whole. “With the people of this region, we have developed a business model which has revolutionised the entire world of electrical engineering. They were people from Ewersbach, Eibelshausen and elsewhere within a radius of 50 kilometres. They were people with ideas.” No-one – including his father, he himself and the management of the day – could have imagined that Rittal enclosures would be in global use just a few decades later. Opposition to the concept of a standard enclosure came from the world’s leading electrical engineering companies. They rejected the idea of buying enclosures “from a mail-order catalogue”. But with the slogan “Enclosures available off the shelf. Immediately”, Rittal sparked a revolution. Via the mechanical engineering sector, standard enclosures conquered the industry.

“It is amazing when we look at all the places where these enclosures are being manufactured today,” said Prof. Loh. In the meantime, enclosures are manufactured not only in Rittershausen, but also in Rittal factories in China, India, England, Brazil and the USA. “Across the world, we manufacture several thousand large enclosures every day.” Many others have attempted to follow suit, including major electrical engineering groups, but without success. For Prof. Loh, one of Rittal’s great strengths is its readiness to diverge from the general trends and to tread paths which then place it one step ahead of further developments – for example with expansion of its portfolio from enclosures to systems incorporating climate control and power distribution and subsequently to IT infrastructures. This must also remain the case in the future.

Thanks to this success, Rittal has also become the largest employer in the region. “It cannot be taken for granted that a company will develop in this way for 60 years. It is a gift. It is an unbelievable success story and ample reason to celebrate,” said Prof. Loh to conclude his address.

Markus Asch, CEO Rittal International, went on to emphasise the importance of the VX25: “The large enclosure is the essence of Rittal, and expression of our expertise.” Available in thousands of configuration variants, it meets 90 per cent of all customer requirements worldwide. “Today’s get-together was organised to celebrate the one millionth VX25, but in reality we are celebrating you, the employees who manufacture the enclosures on a daily basis,” said the management board chairman. Together with Norbert Peter, Vice President Operations Germany and plant manager in Rittershausen, he presented a gilded enclosure key and a commemorative certificate to employee representatives, in recognition of the work done by all employees.