History

In 1913, Dipl.-Ing. Theo Schmidt, who until then had worked as an engineer at Polysius AG in Dessau and had already been named sole inventor for two patents for air classifiers, founded the company SCHMIDT & CO in Breslau. Due to the turmoil of the World War II, the company headquarters were initially relocated to Dortmund and ultimately to Dörnigheim, today’s Maintal.

Theo Schmidt started building air classifiers and wrote what was probably the first patent application for a predecessor of today’s cyclone circulating air classifier with a central classifying encloser and several surrounding cyclones.

In 1950, Theo Schmidt’s son-in-law, Wilhelm Münch, took over the management of the company, which was then operating as a limited partnership. In 1973, he became the exclusive owner of the company, which he managed as a family-owned company until 1995.

In 1995, the company passed to his daughter Dr. Nicole Binder on inheritance and was managed on as an interim basis by his son-in-law, Dr. Armin Binder. During this time, a significant number of patent and design applications were registered in the field of air classifiers.

Since 1996, the independent family business has been run in the legal form of a GmbH & Co. KG. The owner of the so formed SCHMIDT & Co. GmbH & Co. KG is Dr. Nicole Binder and the joint partners of SCHMIDT & CO. ENGINEERING GmbH are Dr. Armin Binder and Klaus Schrafft, who has been working as Managing Director for the company since 1996.