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Remembering Hans Müller

Müller started his first company, Grapha Maschinenfabrik, selling his first pad and booklet stitching machine in 1946 and grew that operation into the industry’s largest finishing equipment vendor. Five years after his first machine, he unveiled the first perfect binder, followed by the first saddle stitcher with automatic signature feeders, coupled with a three-knife trimmer in 1954. Whereas his competitors’ machines could stitch 1,000 copies per hour, Müller’s machines could do 4,000. 

In 1955, the company changed its name to Hans Müller AG and began selling machines in the United States. In 1956, he introduced “flying stitching heads”, which for the first time stitched without stop and go, enabling a further significant increase in production speed.

The company founded the Grapha printing press factory in Maulburg, Germany, in 1964 and integrated Swiss-based Martini AG in 1969. In 1998, it added VBF Buchtechnologie. Today the company operates nine production facilities around the world.

Hans Müller handed off control of the company to the next generation in 1991, with Rudolf Müller holding the role of CEO today.

“I’m happy that I’ve managed to provide our discerning customers with innovative and market-driven solutions in the form of our machines. Some solutions were developed in response to suggestions by customers and in close cooperation with them,” he once said in an interview. He attributes a factor for the company’s success to the high esteem in which Müller Martini held to its employees. “I find it highly gratifying that I could give many people interesting tasks.”