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Bilfinger is a Mannheim-based civil and industrial engineering company in Germany. Established in 1880 by August Bernatz, who originally operated under the guise of Bernatz Ingenieurwissenschaft, Bilfinger is a firm that’s gone from strength to strength. 12 years after its foundation, Paul Bilfinger replaced Bernatz as the company’s leader, resulting in the name change.

Bilfinger has acquired a string of businesses through the years, namely Julius Berger-Bauboag AG (1970), Razel Company (1994), Babcock Borsig Service Group (2005) and MCE Beteiligungsverwaltungs GmbH (2009).

Today, Bilfinger SE is a world-leading industrial services provider. It’s not the conventional construction firm it once was, with its transactions resulting in a shift towards industrial services for power plants, real estate and petrochemical plants.

The late 1990s and early 2000s were something of a boom period for the price of Bilfinger stock. Having traded as low as €13.20 in November 2000, the Bilfinger share price hit €26.50 in January 2002. After a brief decline around the time of the bursting of the dotcom bubble, Bilfinger SE forged ahead to achieve new highs of €70.70 in May 2007, before plummeting fast to €26.13 in October 2008 as the global financial crisis took hold.

Post-2009, the recovery of Bilfinger stock was hugely impressive, surging to an all-time high of €92.72 in April 2014, before a significant correction. The Bilfinger share price fell to €45.09 in December 2014 after investors digested the company’s decision to sell off its construction division to Swiss company Implenia AG. The move effectively ended Bilfinger’s reign as one of the most prominent building firms in Germany.

There are many other companies like Bilfinger across Europe and beyond that look to provide best-in-class industrial services. Schneider Electric is one such competitor. The France-headquartered company has been in existence since 1836 in various guises. Today, the company focuses firmly on digital energy management and automation for domestic and commercial environments.

Swiss company ABB is another of Bilfinger’s closest competitors in the industrial services market. This publicly listed firm has impressive in-house expertise, spanning robotics, automation, electrification and digitalisation for an expansive industrial clientele.

German firm Siemens is also increasingly utilising its technological capabilities to focus on automation, digitalisation and electrification efforts across the industrial landscape. In recent times, Siemens has been better known for its mobile and telecommunications, but it has recently pivoted towards advancing manufacturing and industrial environments.