Demand for digitalization has not faltered during the pandemic. In fact, it has thrived. Automation software and digitalization expert, COPA-DATA experienced this first-hand during 2020 – increasing turnover, expanding its team, and investing in new subsidiaries. Now, the company is making a €10 million investment to headquarters in Salzburg, Austria.
COPA-DATA’s momentum represents an increasing demand for digitalization in its core markets of manufacturing, energy and infrastructure, in which the company generated €54 million turnover last year.
Despite varying economic conditions in its core focus industries, the company achieved six per cent growth from annual sales during 2020. This growth represents an increasing need for digital tools to support businesses in last year’s volatile market conditions.
With its zenon software platform, COPA-DATA provides customers with a tool for data capture, analysis, machine control and automation. Deployable across manufacturing facilities, energy grids and infrastructure projects, zenon can support flexibility, efficiency, and resilience.
Investing in people and places
Recruitment has also been high on COPA-DATA’s agenda, expanding its workforce to over 300 employees worldwide in 2020. This included establishing a new team to lead COPA-DATA’s latest subsidiary, based in Riyadh in Saudi Arabia, in the Middle East. The new facility stands alongside COPA-DATA’s extensive network of local subsidiaries and partners, which now spans six continents.
These achievements have driven further investment in the company’s headquarters in Salzburg, Austria. In October 2020, the foundations were laid for a €10 million low energy facility which will accommodate a further 120 employees. The state-of-the-art site will enable COPA-DATA to better support its subsidiary networks through administrative functions, while also improving the base in which zenon is developed and engineered.
Technology for new challenges
With new iterations of zenon being developed on a yearly basis, expanding COPA-DATA’s headquarters provides opportunity to invest in the company’s engineers. An important part of this investment in 2021 is the latest major release, zenon 10, which was made available in May 2021. The updated version offers customers an integrated overall solution, which has been developed to solve the unprecedented business events that occurred in the previous twelve months.
“Fortunately, we were able to support our customers and partners with our zenon software platform to overcome the unique challenges of 2020,” said Thomas Punzenberger, Founder and CEO of COPA-DATA. “Thanks to our employees and our innovative digital solutions for the fusion of OT and IT, our business has continued to grow steadily. Even in uncertain times, our credo remains purposeful: There must be an easier way!”
COPA-DATA’s investments in people, places and technology will continue in 2021 and beyond, having used the previous year’s growth to enhance the company’s offering. During 2020, COPA-DATA responded to the pandemic-induced contact restrictions by offering a wide range of webinars and digital events. Moving forward, this approach will be further extended and supplemented with hybrid training sessions so customers can choose to participate on-site or virtually.
“During the pandemic, our focus was on keeping contact with our customers and partners as well as with each other as close as possible,” added Phillip Werr, CMO and COO at COPA-DATA. “With our virtual events ‘zenonIZE’ held in June 2020 and 2021, we were able to inspire over 1,000 decision makers in the industry to act right now and continue to drive digitalization forward. We thus provide existing and future users with know-how on industry-specific solutions around our zenon software platform.”
