STIHL EVENT
Pragmatic, Not Dogmatic
Stihl Transforms on a Global Scale in its 99th year
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The world around is shifting super quickly and technologies are advancing at a pace that’ s really challenging all of us, especially the ones that grew in one technology and have to adapt to a second technology,” said Michael Traub, CEO of Stihl AG, to me and a collection of journalists who attended the Stihl International Media Day at the company’ s headquarters in Waiblingen, Germany on Sept. 10 and 11.
“ Ecological challenges are facing us all over the world, politics, economics are all kind of crazy and anything but stable. They affect every player in the industry,” said Traub.“ That’ s the good news. And it’ s really, for a company that turns 100 years old, I think a big test of time and how we’ re able to evolve.”
The main question for Stihl, said Traub –“ it’ s actually a big question for a lot of industries right now” – is how can the company lead the power equipment industry in both gas and battery at the same time?
The“ at the same time” part of Traub’ s question is important to Stihl. It’ s not an either / or question, not gas or battery. He predicts that by 2030,“ a significant share of the market in Europe as well as in North America will remain gas power.” He said one can debate the actual quantity of that significant share, anywhere from 15 % to 30 %.( And is that even“ significant?”)
“ At the same time,” said Traub, we strongly believe that battery business in outdoor power equipment could reach north of 70 % of the business.” Traub is considering the global market in this accounting.
Western Europe will lead that trend, it already is leading.“ Europe will be the key driver for battery adoption in the outdoor power equipment world,” Traub said.“ In many key countries, we already have 50 % of more battery sales. In Germany, it’ s north of 60 %. It’ s not a fantasy or a hobby business.”
Much of the rest of the world, including North America, Eastern Europe, plus Africa, India and large parts of Asia will lag behind.“ Many of these countries will stick with gas for a longer time. It’ s important that we’ re not dogmatic,” he said, as a global manufacturer.
16 OPE + October 2025 www. Ope-Plus. com