11.04.2025 – The 2024 Annual Report is available for download > here.

In our annual report, you can read about the predominantly cyclical influences that led to a decline in our Group sales last year. Major customers and their customers primarily reduced their inventories in response to the reopening of supply chains. With interest rates rising and inflation falling, stockpiling had become unattractive for them.

As an indirect supplier to sensor manufacturers, PLANOPTIK’s Wafer-Level Packaging division has also been affected by the weak global automotive industry.

Sales are already expected to increase again in the current financial year and we continue to expect dynamic growth in the coming years, provided the global economic conditions do not deteriorate significantly.

It is not only the expected completion of the destocking process and the associated recovery in demand that make us confident about the future.

In the area of wafer-level packaging, we supply wafers for the encapsulation of sensors. We thus serve the sensor technology market, which also has great potential for the future. AI-based control systems rely on data from countless sensors. Today, electric cars already contain sensors worth an average of 1,300 euros, while this figure is still 750 euros for cars with combustion engines. And safety technology also requires sensors.

In our Advanced Packaging division, glass is the trend material for integrating chips in the smallest of spaces. Here, PLANOPTIK is at the very beginning of a large growth market that is only just emerging.

There is also great potential in the fact that PLANOPTIK has recently started producing fully functional components made of glass and silicon. Here we are working on the start of series production with specific customers in the field of microfluidics.

In order to meet the increasing demand, we are massively expanding our production. For example, we have rented a new hall at our site in Hungary, increasing our local production area from 400 to 2,000 square meters.

We recently concluded a new low-interest KfW loan of EUR 2.5 million for our investments, which is to be drawn down in 2025 and 2026, primarily to expand our production. Previously, the Group already had EUR 5.2 million in cash and cash equivalents at the end of 2024, which were offset by bank liabilities of just EUR 1.9 million within the Group. With the additional funds, we are once again increasing our financial scope to take advantage of our opportunities and increase our security at the same time.