KONČAR Group – 100 years of excellence without compromise: A small workshop that was destined for greatness
On 24 January 1921, in Zagreb, the KONČAR Group began its journey to reach worldwide markets and to get recognition and confirmation of important customers...
On 24 January 1921, in Zagreb, the KONČAR Group began its journey to reach worldwide markets and to get recognition and confirmation of important customers on the global level. The period of 100 years sounds even longer when you take into account the fact that, at the time in which the company was founded, the Kingdom of Yugoslavia still existed, and many different country governances have exchanged on its territory ever since. However, KONČAR, operating then under the company name “Elektra” , immediately demonstrated that it was a company ahead of its time. During that same year, the company became an integral part of the globally known company “Siemens”. By 1930, the first squirrel-cage asynchronous motors with power ranging from 0.25 to 7.5 kW and with enamelled stator windings, instead of cotton-insulated wires, were delivered. The ten-thousandth motor was delivered in October 1940. Today, the KONČAR Group is known for its transformers. In 1947, it began batch manufacturing the first transformers rated up to 35 kV. At the same time, the company also started manufacturing low-oil instrument transformers intended for distribution networks and industrial plants with the highest operating voltage of up to 35 kV, and the rest is history.
At the forefront of development, innovations and quality standards
KONČAR Group has been destined for greatness from the very beginning, as demonstrated by the significant breakthroughs that started in 1948. Manufacture of high-voltage pneumatic circuit breakers for voltages of 110 and 220 kV started under the licence of the French company “Merlin Gerin”, and the first RK generator with a power of 24 MVA, voltage of 10 kV and weight of 220 tonnes was completed during that same year. This generator was installed in HPP Mariborski otok in Slovenia. Furthermore, it was commissioned only 17 months following the conclusion of the agreement, and it became a symbol of KONČAR. After 40 years of successful operation, it has now become a museum piece. The year 1955 marked a special year for the successful portfolio of the KONČAR Group because, in 1955, the first prototypes of electric motors with power ranging from 1 to 25 kW were made. These represented a new series of motors that were characterised by a greater power and lower weight. The true revolution started in 1958, when KONČAR made the first prototype of a special magnetic quadrupole lens in Europe, after which ten of those lenses were delivered for the proton synchrotron of the CERN Nuclear Institute in Switzerland.
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