The prospective concepts company was set up 15 years ago by Andreas Reinhard as an ideas and innovation laboratory. From the outset, various innovation projects focussing on “Use of air” and “Movement in the air” were implemented in cooperation with the pneumatics company Festo AG (Dietikon, CH/ Esslingen, D). Over the years, many product ideas were developed and taken through to the prototype stage. In the case of some projects with a well-assured future, series-readiness was achieved, so making active marketing the next essential step. However, as this does not fall within the business scope and expertise of prospective concepts and the development of production and marketing resources was not felt to make sound strategic sense, the projects concerned were handed on to professional marketing specialists at this stage. In the measuring technology sector for example, this approach led to the incorporation of the MSR Electronics GmbH company via a management buyout; this company handles appliance marketing. In the area of pneumatic structures, an agreement was reached with the long-standing development partner Lantal Textiles of Langenthal, the market leader in textile applications for civil aviation and public transport which took over responsibility for the further development and marketing of this product segment. Research activities in the area of “Tensairity”, pneumatic bearing structures, was transferred to a newly founded "Center for Synergetic Structures“ at Empa, a research establishment forming part of the Swiss Institute of Technology ETH.

In the aeronautical projects segment, tasks are to be undertaken in future which call for a different corporate structure with a stronger focus on project-specific issues. The decision was therefore taken to set up a new company to handle these projects under the sole management of Andreas Reinhard: iii-solutions GmbH.

In the transitional phase, the prospective concepts company will handle all the activities required for optimum resource transfer and take over management or licensing of the technologies protected by patents. In addition the facilities at St. Stephan were sold to the company prospective concepts aeronautics ag (Tel. +41 33 722 24 22).