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Since 1926, KEBO has been developing speciality chemicals for industrial processes.
To mark our 100th anniversary, we are sharing the story behind our company: personal memories, conversations about the future of the process industries, and insights into the work of the people who have shaped KEBO.
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→ Interviews with eyewitnesses to history
→ The KEBO Anniversary Podcast
🎙️Now available: Podcast Episode 2 – “Can sugar become a key feedstock for the chemical industry?”What role could sugar play in the future of bio-based plastics, chemicals and industrial processes? Together with industry expert Arvind Chudasama, we discuss the opportunities, challenges and future of industrial biotechnology.
🎥 Now available: Interview Part 2 – “Continuing – seizing opportunities and driving change”
In the second part of our interview series, Uta Kruckenhauser talks about how KEBO made a new start after the Second World War. She shares stories of courage, difficult decisions and why looking to the future continues to shape the company to this day.
A company’s history is about more than dates, products and milestones. It is shaped by the people who have taken responsibility, shared their knowledge and brought new ideas to life.
That is why we are marking our anniversary year with a range of different formats.
In our three-part interview series, Uta Kruckenhauser, daughter of the company’s founder, shares personal insights into key phases of KEBO’s history.
In our podcast, we talk to colleagues and external experts about current developments and the future of the process industries.
Our historical series takes you through ten decades of KEBO, while “The People Behind KEBO” introduces the people who are behind our products and processes today.
→ Listen to all podcast episodes
→ Explore 100 years of KEBO across ten decades
For 100 years, our solutions have been shaped not at a desk, but where they matter most.
They are developed where our customers work.
For example:
Every industrial process has its own requirements. Raw materials, water quality, temperatures, plant conditions and production methods all influence which solution works in practice.
That is why, for us, speciality chemicals do not start with a finished product. They start with a specific challenge and an understanding of the process in question.
Many of our developments have emerged from this exchange: from observations on site, joint trials and experience built up over many years.
This close collaboration with our customers has shaped KEBO since 1926.
How are digitalisation and artificial intelligence changing sales? What role could sugar play as a feedstock for the chemical industry in the future? And what role does marketing play in a medium-sized speciality chemicals company? …and many more fascinating topics are part of our everyday work.
In our podcast, we talk to internal and external guests about topics that matter to our industry and our customers. Practical experience, different perspectives and new ideas come together.
The podcast deliberately looks ahead.
For us, an anniversary is not just an opportunity to look back at the past.
It is also a good time to talk about current developments and the challenges that lie ahead.
What remains from 100 years of company history? It is the people, their values and the stories that never make it into the official record.
In a three-part video interview series, Uta Kruckenhauser shares personal insights into the development of KEBO. Together with Stephanie Wedehase, she talks about the founding of the company, difficult times, bold decisions and the strong ties within the family and the company.
The story is not just about major turning points. It is the small memories and anecdotes in particular that show how KEBO became what it is today.
One sentence runs through many of these stories:
“Our solution has always been: We get on with it.”
→ Explore the interview series
Speciality chemicals are not created in a single step. Turning a specific challenge into a solution for practical application takes collaboration across many different areas of the company.
Research and development, production, quality management, procurement, customer service, sales, logistics, IT and administration all contribute in different ways to keeping processes running smoothly, ensuring products are available and sharing knowledge.
Some of our colleagues have been with KEBO for decades. Others bring new experience and fresh perspectives. Together, they combine continuity with change.
Throughout our anniversary year, we are introducing some of these people, their roles and the areas they work in.
A company’s history does not happen all at once – it grows step by step. That is why, throughout our anniversary year, KEBO is telling its story in stages: month by month, decade by decade.
In our LinkedIn series “100 Years in 10 Decades”, we tell the story of KEBO in ten chapters, looking back ten times throughout the year at defining moments from 100 years of KEBO, in chronological order.
Each post represents a decade and shows how a small family business developed into an internationally active specialist in industrial process chemicals. Each story focuses on one defining event, memory or moment.
At the heart of these stories are the people, developments, turning points and small anecdotes that have shaped KEBO.
A look back that connects the past with the present – and sets the stage for personal accounts from those who experienced it first-hand and for looking ahead to the future.
Discover the key milestones in our history.
KEBO’s history began with products designed to protect industrial plants from corrosion. Over the course of many decades, this area of expertise developed into a broad portfolio of speciality chemicals for a wide range of applications across the process industries.
New challenges emerged as production methods changed and customers approached us with new requirements. Individual products developed into product groups, while initial applications evolved into long-term areas of expertise.
Today, KEBO develops and manufactures solutions for companies around the world, including in:
Every industry has its own requirements.
Despite the differences between these sectors, they all have one thing in common: processes need to run reliably, efficiently and safely. Our role is to understand the specific conditions and work together with our customers to find the right solution.
When the two chemical engineers and university friends Alfred Keller and Albin Bohacek laid the foundation for today's Keller & Bohacek GmbH & Co. KG in 1926, the world was a different place. But their passion for chemistry endured, enabling KEBO to become what it is today.
Over the past 100 years, industrial processes, technologies and markets have undergone fundamental change. And that development will continue.
New raw materials, changing production conditions, growing demands for efficiency and sustainability, and new technological possibilities will continue to raise questions for which there is no standard answer.
That is precisely where we come in.
We listen, analyse the bigger picture and develop solutions that prove their value in practice.
That is how we have worked since 1926. And that is how we will continue to shape the story of KEBO.
The products shown on our website are only a selection of our entire product range. There is no universal remedy for the rapid removal of impurities. Some can be removed well with alkaline agents, others better in the acidic range. The large variety of conceivable cleaning problems and the large number of additives, inhibitors and ready-to-use cleaning solutions offered by us make it advisable to obtain detailed advice before starting cleaning.
The same applies to inhibitors, defoamers, scale preventers, corrosion inhibitors, pickling inhibitors, etc. Depending on the plant, material, product and the type of boiler/cooling water is used, different individual challenges arise. We are well equipped for them.
Talk to us, we will be happy to help!
On request, we can analyze deposits in our laboratory and develop a cleaning strategy based on our many years of experience, taking into account the conditions on site.
