Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2005/02/18
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Leica is going the same way as thousands (ANNUALLY!!)of other companies in Germany, large medium and small. Germany is no longer the power behind industry and finance in Europe, Germany never woke up to the facts of life that industry and manufacturing alone are not the basis for economic success (compare the transformation of the UK from an industrial to a services economy). Germany has expensive and outdated labour laws which force a company to pay a lot more for employing a worker than the worker actually receives, eg the half of his health insurance, social security and accident insurance, pension schemes and similar. These "Nebenkosten" have resulted in the re-location of production to cheaper countries or, in many cases, insolvency. Neither the conservatives (Kohl) or the socialists (Schr?der) have managed to get any kind of consensus between industry, finance, government and unions and the so called "B?ndnis f?r Arbeit" planned to make an effort to reduce unemployment when it was still below 3 million,was a still-born child. A company with a low profit margin or a niche product just cannot survive in the present situation. Poor Leica is in the quandary of remaining "Made in Germany" or closing down - a Leica produced anywhere else is of course "tainted" - see the price differences between s/h Wetzlar and Portugal products. A technological unit such as Leica must have been in a very sorry state of affairs when only a fashion house was prepared to pump money into it. The question arises - did it do either company any good? I think not. I expect, unless anything really surprising happens, that Leica will go the same way as many others and add another couple of hundred to the more than 5 million unemployed over here. A very sad situation out of which Leica will probably not be able to extricate themselves. I'm expecting editorials and comments on the business and finance pages of the local papers here in Hannover over the next few days, if there's anything interesting I'll translate and post it Douglas > mak@teleport.com writes in part: > > > > Based on 50% loss from the last reported financials (see Leica > > website) and nothing promising in the pipeline (portending massive > > future losses) what would it take to buy Leica Camera? > > > I wonder if they are just anticapating a further drop in share value. In > the last 52 weeks Leica Camera AG share prices are down 31%. I suspect that > the strong Euro hasn't helped their financials. > > Regards, > > Greg > > _______________________________________________ > Leica Users Group. > See http://leica-users.org/mailman/listinfo/lug for more information >