World Champion Austria Business Oscar
Unlimited Opportunities EV Group, Steyr Motors and Skidata are the winners of the Business Oscars 2016, an award for top achievements of Austrian companies in the United States. They proved their strength in the world’s most demanding and competitive market.
2016 was a record year for Austro-American business relations: For the first time, the United States had become Austria’s s econdmost-important export market (the US has already been the largest overseas partner for a long time). The aim of the USABizAward, the so-called Business Oscars, is to highlight the excellent and often unknown achievements of Austrian companies on the ultra-competitive US market. In 2016, it was awarded for the sixth time by the Foreign Trade Center Los Angeles of Advantage Austria – for innovation, for excellence in market cultivation and market presence. And the USABizAward 2016 goes to… Innovative! EV Group from St. Florian am Inn is the technology and market leader in precision plants for the manufacture of semiconductors, microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), compound semiconductors, power devices and nanotechnology devices. EVG plants are producing for example modules for renowned smartphone manufacturers. Every four seconds a bonded wafer leaves a bonding module in an EVG plant. The company was awarded for being the “Supplier of the Year” at the MEMS & Sensor Innovation Award in California; about a quarter of the global turnover is generated in North America. Also nominated for the Business Oscar: AMS AG, the number one in light sensors, and SamXtec Animal Care Sales GmbH, market leader in the collection of body data in dairy cows. Spectacular! The Upper Austrian specialist in Diesel engines Steyr Motors managed to win a tender in the highly competitive US defence
sector to equip 400 patrol boats in the US Navy. Innovation was the company’s big selling point: An engine start without water-cooling, a hybrid engine, immediate operational readiness and an easy to use dashboard. The high tech motors can run on various fuels and are also in demand in the commercial sector. The other nominee was Head Sport GmbH, who was the manufacturers champion at the Skiing World Championships in Vail and Beaver Creek: Most medals were won on Head skis. Market penetration! Salzburg-based technology leader Skidata is the number one in the United States when it comes to access systems in several areas such as car parks, airports and ski lifts. 25 loyalty solutions were installed at top US sports teams in the National Football League, the National Hockey League and the National Basketball League. Furthermore, the company was awarded the tenders for parking access systems at the airports in Sacramento, Orlando and Dallas as well as renowned ski resorts. In order to strengthen its market position, Skidata bought two US companies and 3M’s parking technology, and opened a research and development centre in Dallas, Texas. The number of US employees tripled to almost 200 staff and turnover on the US market grew by 150 percent. The other nominees: Hans Künz GmbH became the US market leader in the field of intermodal cranes, and Bachmann Electronic GmbH achieved a US market share of almost 50 percent with its controls for wind power plants. Wind power boom leads to world-class performances More than 20,000 wind power plants in the United States