SEW-EURODRIVE GmbH & Co KG is a German manufacturing company headquartered in Bruchsal, Germany.
The company produces gear units, motors, electric motor and inverter technology.
The beginnings under Ernst Blickle
Started with the designer Albert Obermoser. His geared motor, designed in 1928, revolutionized drive technology. Christian Pähr, a trained banker, recognized the enormous potential of that drive design and acquired the rights to the geared motor from the bankrupt estate of Obermoser AG. Despite economic and political turmoil, he founded the company “Süddeutsche-Elektromotoren-Werke” in 1931, known since 1971 as SEW-EURODRIVE. Just a few years later in 1935, when Christian Pähr died, his wife Kunigunde Pähr took over the company with the support of their daughter Edeltraut Pähr. In 1945, Ernst Wilhelm Blickle, Christian Pähr’s son-in-law, took over as managing director of the company.
Until 1945, when the Allied Strategic Command bombed Bruchsal into rubble, SEW produced motors. After Germany’s surrender the company became an entity of the US—via the Marshall Plan. When this was concluded in 1948, the company was returned to its owners, the Blickles. Due to increasing production demands following the economic growth after the war, Ernst Blickle laid the cornerstone for a 10,000 square meter manufacturing facility in Graben, ten kilometers away. In the wake of a plant expansion at a later time, Ernst Blickle also had social rooms constructed for his employees and training workshops.
In 1965, SEW-EURODRIVE presented its innovative modular system for gearmotors. The customized production is organized centrally in a small number of plants with high volumes while assembly is performed as close as possible to the customer. This ensures a greater degree of customization with short delivery times. After the death of Ernst Blickle in 1987, his sons Rainer and Jürgen Blickle took over as managing partners of SEW-EURODRIVE.
