Federal Justice Minister honors Germany’s best apprentices: thyssenkrupp apprentice among the award winners

thyssenkruppFederal Minister of Justice Heiko Maas today honored Germany’s best apprentices in Berlin. The award for best machinist apprentice went to Martin Stemmer from thyssenkrupp. The 24-year-old recently completed his three-year apprenticeship at thyssenkrupp’s slewing bearings production facility in Lippstadt.


“It’s a great experience to be here at the ceremony in Berlin. I’m delighted to receive this award. The last three years have been really hard work, but we have learnt such a lot. Now it’s time to start working life – at thyssenkrupp of course,” says Stemmer, who is from Lippstadt.

Every year the Association of German Chambers of Industry and Commerce (DIHK) honors the best apprentices in Germany. From the 300,000 plus apprentices who complete their final Chamber of Industry and Commerce examinations each year, roughly the top 200 are selected. In addition to the DIHK award, Martin Stemmer was also named best apprentice in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia alongside one of his thyssenkrupp colleagues.

“We are very proud of our two young colleagues. We set high standards for the quality of our apprenticeships and our apprentices. The awards vindicate our approach: We attach great importance to teamwork and give responsibility to our apprentices at an early stage. We encourage the curiosity of our young colleagues and support their participation in contests such as the “Jugend forscht” youth science competition,” says Winfried Schulte, CEO of the slewing bearings division at thyssenkrupp.

In this unit alone, around thirty new apprentices start their careers every year at the German locations in Dortmund, Lippstadt and Eberswalde. Alongside commercial apprenticeships, the company also offers technical apprenticeships such as industrial mechanic, machinist or process mechanic. Machinist is one of the ten most popular apprenticeships at the industrial group.

At thyssenkrupp around 900 young people in total began their apprenticeships in September 2015. The Group currently employs more than 3,200 apprentices nationwide, the majority in North Rhine-Westphalia. The company invests constantly in the quality of its training. In 2015 alone, thyssenkrupp opened two new training centers. All training facilities are equipped to high technical standards, with the apprentices learning their trade with advanced machinery. Training is carried out at more than 30 training workshops and 54 works schools. Around 130 trainers ensure the high training standards at thyssenkrupp are maintained.

thyssenkrupp is a diversified industrial group with traditional strengths in materials and a growing share of capital goods and services businesses. Around 155,000 employees in nearly 80 countries work with passion and technological expertise to develop high-quality products and intelligent industrial processes and services for sustainable progress. Their skills and commitment are the basis of our success. In fiscal year 2014/2015 thyssenkrupp generated sales of around €43 billion.

Together with our customers we develop competitive solutions for the challenges of the future in the areas Mechanical, Plant and Materials. With our engineering expertise we enable our customers to gain an edge in the global market and manufacture innovative products in a cost- and resource-friendly way. For us, technical progress and innovations, allied with the combined strength of the Group, are key factors enabling us to meet current and future customer and market requirements around the world, grow on the markets of the future, and generate strong and stable earnings, cash flows and value growth.