| News |  Takeover Could Signal New Strategy for China
Is there a greater insult for a business owner in Germany's famously house-proud Swabia region than being told its facilities are too dirty? If there is, it would have to be the accusation that he has sold his life's work to the communists.
Karl Schlecht has had to live with this verdict since the Friday before last. Schlecht, 79, has sold the company that he founded, the concrete pump manufacturer Putzmeister Group, to its rival Sany, a construction machinery giant from the southern Chinese city of Changsha.
The deal, hammered out in secret, has triggered a "state of shock" at Putzmeister headquarters in Aichtal near Stuttgart, says a member of the company's works council: "Not even the supervisory board was informed." On Monday of last week, 700 Putzmeister employees gathered in front of the factory gates to protest the sale to the Chinese.
In the meantime, company founder Schlecht went on a tour of China, at the invitation of the purchasers. A butler attended to his needs in a luxury guesthouse in Changsha, and Sany Chairman Liang Wengen put one of his four Maybach limousines, complete with a chauffeur, at Schlecht's disposal. The German guest was also flown in the company helicopter to the birthplace of the former Chinese dictator, Mao Zedong.
'Monumental Stupidity'
Schlecht cannot understand the consternation of his employees in Aichtal. He calls their reaction "monumental stupidity."
|  The History of Concrete Pumping
The PumpCrete by Rexnord or Chain Belt is believed to be the worlds first Concrete Pump 1930
Richard Bennett and Marvin Bennett Interview 1954 to 1976
Putzmeister Organization Celebrates 50 years in 2008
George Macarr and Duane O. Perrin 1964
Conforms, Robert Westerlund, Herb Westerlund and Bob Siderits 1969
Dave Gaston Started in the industry 1958
United States Patents
|  China's Sany to acquire Putzmeister
China has laid claim to a pillar of German industry after Sany Heavy Industry, the country’s largest construction equipment group, said it would acquire Putzmeister, a Mittelstand company that makes high-tech concrete pumps.
|  Schwing GmbH, a German maker of concrete pumps, is up for sale, as Rothschild has been given a mandate to sell...
Schwing GmbH, a German maker of concrete pumps, is up for sale, as Rothschild has been given a mandate to sell the business or find an investor, the Financial Times Deutschland reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
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