Reichle & De-Massari AG (R&M), based in Wetzikon, is an independent Swiss family business specializing in information and communication technology. The company concentrates on the development and manufacture of cabling technology for communications networks.
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R&M was founded by Hans Reichle and Renato De-Massari in 1965 as a two-man business. The two employees of Switzerland’s telecommunications company came up with the idea of a new, easier-to-install telephone outlet, which to this day is known as Reichle-Connector in Switzerland. Originally R&M was set up to develop this product and market it throughout Switzerland. The company then broadened its range of products and services to cabling technology for data and voice networks as a whole, based on copper and optical fiber cabling (glass and polymer fibers). One of the firm’s core products is its Cat. 6 module for Ethernet networks, which is widely used in networks all over the world. The product’s success was founded on, among other things, its sales partnership with IBM, which lasted many years (1993-1999). Following the death of Renato De-Massari, his business partner Hans Reichle took overall charge of the company. On the company’s 40th anniversary in 2005 Hans Reichle retired to the Board of Directors and handed over operational responsibilities to his two sons Martin and Peter, who now run the company in their respective positions as CEO and COO. Although R&M is a joint stock company, it is not quoted on the Stock Exchange.
R&M operates four business units: Carrier, Enterprise, Industrial and Residential Cabling. Carrier Cabling relates to cabling technology for trunk traffic while Enterprise Cabling deals with network cabling solutions within companies of all sizes. Industrial Cabling focuses on networks in industrial environments, whose production conditions are often so tough that the components used must meet particularly high stability requirements. Residential Cabling covers the area of networking in private residential environments, and a trend is already noticeable in this market. All R&M products are limited to network cabling technology. Yet the company nonetheless offers its customers the installation of complete solutions through certified partners.
R&M is one of the companies who offer 10Gbit Ethernet via copper cables. R&M is a defender of the shielded cabling technology, but in order to meet market requirements they developed a new way to combine the advantages of shielded and unshielded cabling. With this new WARP technology (short for Wave Reduction Patterns), the cables and modules are shielded over their entire length with about 1.6 cm foil segments and metallic plates which are not connected to one another and are isolated by small gaps. One particular feature of this “floating” shielding is that it does not need to be grounded; this in turn means that, unlike traditional shielding, transmission bandwidth is not affected, but still provides adequate protection against NEXT.
WARP technology is a combination of this type of “interrupted” shielding and symmetrical signal transmission. The symmetry of the signals eliminates the interference that affects both fibers (common mode interference); only the difference between the two fibers of a twisted pair is evaluated. All the interference that might affect only one of the two fibers is caught by the twisting of the fibers and to a large extent by the special shielding.
R&M subsidiaries have been established in, among others, Austria, Dubai, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Poland and Singapore. The whole of southern Europe is served from Austria. R&M has many representative office in Europe and Asia as e.g. in Saudi Arabia (Riyadh) which is one of the biggest and emerging markets of Middle East.The company also has marketing partners in many other countries. R&M is very much export-oriented, with around 75 percent of its turnover achieved outside Switzerland. Regarding to the international growth R&M builds in Wetzikon, Switzerland, the so called "Cube" a new development and logistics center R&M Cube“ to the public. The building will conform to high-performance Minergy standards and boast a low-exergy HVAC system with zero use of fossil fuels and minimal electricity. Energy will be provided by a geothermal heat pump system. The first regional management and logistics hub for Asia & Pacific will be opened in September 2008. The company is fully owned by the Reichle family and has around 650 employees. The company’s annual sales in 2007 amounted to CHF 241 million (around €160 million).