Bosch Engineering unveils new campus in Holzkirchen

Holzkirchen, Germany – Commenced in August 2019, the project to build a new Bosch campus in Holzkirchen, south of Munich, has involved the excavation of 60,000 cubic meters of earth, the installation of 3,000 metric tons of steel, and the mobilization of four huge cranes. At peak times, there were as many as 150 construction workers on site. Representatives from Bosch Engineering and ITK Engineering have now gathered on July 12 to unveil the new development campus. Offering 17,000 square meters of state-of-the-art lab and office space, the three-story building will in the medium term accommodate up to 900 associates. Bosch Engineering and ITK Engineering both offer innovative development services in the automotive, off-highway, rail engineering, and medical systems sectors. The new location’s defining characteristic is its campus atmosphere, providing an ultramodern and creative working environment that offers freedom for innovation and flexibility while promoting close and effective cooperation with external partners. For both companies, it is their second-largest corporate location, topped only by their headquarters in Ruelzheim and Abstatt respectively.

A milestone of future engineering

“We are delighted to have successfully completed construction,” says site manager Jens Hofmann. “We now have a new and attractive state-of-the-art workspace for around 500 associates.” An initial cohort of this workforce has already relocated.
The building has various lab facilities in the basement. On the first floor, there is a health and relaxation zone, a café, a staff restaurant, and a customer-meeting zone. Above, Bosch Engineering associates have offices on the second floor, and ITK Engineering associates on the third.
“This expansion marks a further milestone in our drive to strengthen and increase our development and engineering competence,” says Dr. Johannes-Jörg Rüger, managing director of Bosch Engineering. “All the activities at this location are in fast-growing, future-oriented fields, which is why the expansion represents a long-term investment in the company’s future and our innovative power.”
Frank Schmidt, managing director of ITK Engineering, adds: “The new Holzkirchen campus gives us the ideal environment to set new standards as an international development partner in the field of software and system development. The Munich metropolitan region provides us with great opportunities to connect with partners and thereby advance the technology we need to build the future of automated driving, electromobility, Industry 4.0, rail engineering, and medical systems.”
Next to the building is a parking garage with space for around 800 vehicles and around 150 bicycles as well as charging stations for as many as 50 electric vehicles and e-bikes.

More than just an office building

The Holzkirchen campus provides both companies with much more than just a new development location. “We want to provide our associates with a place where they can work in what is an optimal environment for them, depending on the type of task or project they’re currently involved in,” Hofmann says. “This means a choice of quiet areas for individual working, attractive spaces for creative tasks, and our state-of-the-art lab facilities.” The idea is to encourage both creativity and productivity. Behind this versatile workspace is the Smart Work concept that Bosch has already implemented at other of its locations. This encourages a new and modern style of cooperation, marrying the best of both worlds through a smart mix of on-site and off-site working. Associates are therefore free to organize their working day. What counts, in the end, is what this work delivers.
A key characteristic of the campus concept is its connectivity with the outside world. “We want to create a place where people from Bosch, ITK Engineering, and the world outside can meet and work together,” Hofmann explains. In the future, the campus will stage, for example, networking events with other companies and also open its doors to visits from the general public.

Climate neutrality and energy efficiency

Both the campus building and the parking garage have been designed on the basis of environmental and sustainable principles. Installed on both roof surfaces is a photovoltaic system with a combined kilowatt-peak rating of approximately 550 kWp. Heat pumps cover the cooling requirements for lab facilities and test benches all year around, with the waste heat this produces being used to generate hot water and to heat the buildings. This eliminates around 650 MWh respectively 120 metric tons of carbon emissions gas consumption per year. The project also features further state-of-the-art measures to enhance energy efficiency, including reduced and optimized operating temperatures, LED lighting, heat-recovery systems, and intelligent lighting and ventilation control. In the mid-term, Holzkirchen will also reduce carbon emissions by using deep geothermal energy produced by local utility Gemeindewerke Holzkirchen. This will cut gas consumption by around 880 Mwh/a respectively some 150 metric tons of carbon emissions a year for the entire Bosch location in Holzkirchen. In total, these measures mean that the Holzkirchen campus will operate without the use of fossil fuels.

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Background Information

Site expansion marks a milestone for Bosch Engineering and ITK Engineering

Bosch Engineering first located in Holzkirchen some 20 years ago and has occupied a site in the town’s Nord industrial park since 2015. In recent years, the location has become the company’s competence center for electromobility and prototype construction, providing workshop and state-of-the-art test bench facilities. It also develops and advances automated driving and steering solutions for passenger cars plus automation and assistance systems for off-highway vehicles. With around 250 associates, Holzkirchen is Bosch Engineering’s second-biggest location in Germany, after the company’s headquarters in Abstatt, near Heilbronn.
The creation of the new campus also marks a new chapter in the story of growth written by ITK Engineering over the past few decades. The Bosch subsidiary first opened a Munich location back in 2002 – initially in the Pasing district, with a handful of employees. Most recently, the company has occupied a site in Martinsried, a suburb of Munich, from where 200 or so associates are now relocating to Holzkirchen. This number is slated to double by 2025, with the company looking first and foremost to hire engineers, scientists, and computer scientists. ITK Engineering currently has a workforce of 1,300 associates.
In the future, further Bosch divisions / operating units are likely to occupy space at the Holzkirchen location. The Bosch spin-off NEVONEX GmbH, for example, has been in residence in Holzkirchen since the beginning of 2022.