Bosch (company)
Robert Bosch GmbH, commonly known as Bosch, is a German multinational engineering and technology company headquartered in Gerlingen, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. The company was founded by Robert Bosch in Stuttgart in 1886. Bosch is 94% owned by the Robert Bosch Stiftung, a charitable institution. Although the charity is funded by owning the vast majority of shares, it has no voting rights and is involved in health and social causes unrelated to Bosch's business.
Bosch's core operating areas are spread across four business sectors: mobility, consumer goods, industrial technology, and energy and building technology.
In terms of revenue, Bosch is the largest automotive supplier. From 2025 onwards, Bosch faced massive economic problems in these automotive sector, because global sellery of German cars is declining.
History
1886–1920
The company began in Stuttgart-West as the Werkstätte für Feinmechanik und Elektrotechnik on 15 November 1886. From 1897, Bosch started installing magneto ignition devices into automobiles and became a supplier of an ignition system. In 1902, the chief engineer at Bosch, Gottlob Honold, unveiled the high-voltage magneto ignition system with a spark plug.In 1901, Bosch opened its first factory in Stuttgart. In 1906, the company produced its 100,000th magneto. In the same year, Bosch introduced the eight-hour day for workers. In 1910, the Feuerbach plant was founded near Stuttgart, where Bosch began producing generators and headlights in 1914. The motorization of road traffic led to the company's rapid growth after 1900. Bosch had a workforce of 45 in 1901, which grew to more than 1,000 by 1908.
Bosch's international development began in 1898 with the opening of a branch in London, followed the next year by Paris, Vienna, and Budapest. By 1909, Bosch was represented by trading partners on every continent. Bosch opened the first factory outside Germany in Paris in 1905 and the first on another continent in 1912 in Springfield, Massachusetts. In 1913, Bosch founded an apprentice workshop to recruit young people for the production of automotive electrics.
In 1917, Bosch was transformed into a corporation and remained so until 1937, when Robert Bosch regained sole ownership by purchasing back his shares. In the process, the company became a limited liability company.
1920s–1940s
After the First World War, Bosch lost most of its international holdings, including its US factories. The company had to rebuild its global activities. This included expansion in South America and Asia. In 1922, Illies & Company established a sales office for Bosch in Calcutta, India. In the years that followed, Bosch concluded contracts in Asia with sales partners in Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, and Indonesia, as well as on the American continents with partners in Mexico, Peru, Colombia, and Ecuador.In the 1920s, Bosch expanded its product range to include numerous automotive technology products essential for cars, such as electric horns, windshield wipers, and direction indicators. In 1927, Bosch launched injection pumps for diesel engines. Bosch purchased the gas appliances production facility from Junkers & Co. in 1932 as a part of a diversification strategy. In 1932, the company developed its first electric drill and presented its first car radio. In 1933, Bosch introduced its first electric refrigerator for private households.
Effect of Nazi regime
Like most German businesses at the time, Bosch had links to the ruling Nazi Party. Prior to World War II, Bosch under the direction of the Nazi Party began relocating armament production to Germany's interior. Bosch founded two factories in 1935 and 1937: Dreilinden Maschinenbau GmbH in Kleinmachnow and Feinmechanische Industrie GmbH in Hildesheim, for armament production. These factories were built secretly and in close cooperation with the Nazi authorities. In 1937, Bosch AG became a limited liability company.The Bosch subsidiary Dreilinden Maschinenbau GmbH in Kleinmachnow employed around 5,000 people, more than half of whom were forced labourers, prisoners of war, and female concentration camp prisoners, including many women from the Warsaw Uprising. During the Second World War, there were at least 3,000 workers in the mechanics division at the Bosch Hildesheim factory, almost all of them from nearby occupied countries; there were only 200 recorded German workers. In the last years of the war, all new German tanks included starter elements from the Bosch factory in Hildesheim. Bosch had a monopoly position in the outfitting of German Luftwaffe aircraft.
21st century
In 2001, Bosch acquired Mannesmann Rexroth AG, which they later renamed to Bosch Rexroth AG. In the same year, the company opened a new testing center in Vaitoudden, close to Arjeplog in north Sweden. A new development center for automotive engineering, in Abstatt, Germany was constructed shortly after. In 2002, Bosch acquired Philips CSI, which at the time was manufacturing a broad range of professional communication and security products and systems including CCTV, congress, and public address systems. In the 2000s the company developed the electric hydraulic brake, common rail fuel injection with piezo-injectors, digital car radio with a disc drive, and the cordless screwdriver with a lithium-ion battery in 2003. In 2004, Bosch bought Sigpack Systems from SIG.Bosch received the Deutsche Zukunftspreis from the German president in 2005 and 2008. A new development center was planned in 2008 in Renningen. In 2014, the first departments moved to the new center, while the remaining departments followed in 2015. In 2006, Bosch acquired Telex Communications and Electro-Voice. In 2009, Bosch invested about in research and development. Approximately 3,900 patents are published per year. In addition to increasing energy efficiency by employing renewable energies, the company plans to invest in new areas such as biomedical engineering.
In May 2019, Bosch said it planned to reach carbon neutrality by 2020 by investing in clean electricity and a carbon offset program. In July 2019, Bosch sold its packaging machinery business unit to CVC Capital Partners, which was subsequently rebranded to Syntegon. Bosch has formed a strategic alliance with the Technische Universität Darmstadt. In the first quarter of 2020, Bosch was certified as being carbon neutral, across more than 400 sites, worldwide. In 2020, Bosch funded the creation of a report entitled Decarbonising Road Transport: There Is No Silver Bullet, which contained disputed information about the environmental performance of electric vehicles.
In January 2021, Volkswagen filed a class-action against Bosch and Continental AG in the United States after VW was forced to reduce production due to a lack of automotive microchips. On 26 January 2021, the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed that Bosch won on all claims. In June 2021, Bosch opened a newly built semiconductor manufacturing plant in which it invested, its largest-ever spending on a single project. In April 2022, Bosch acquired Five.ai, a vehicular automation startup. Also in April 2022, Bosch acquired Arioso Systems, a Dresden-based MEMS micro speaker producer, added to Bosch Sensortec GmbH.
In July 2022, Bosch announced plans to invest into its semiconductor chip production and R&D over the next four years, including opening new facilities for manufacturing a computer chip development in Dresden and Reutlingen. China is both a market and a manufacturing location for Bosch. In 2023, Bosch had 58,000 employees in China and group sales of CNY 139.1 billion. In September 2023, Bosch acquired TSI Semiconductors, a Roseville-headquartered silicon carbide power device manufacturer. In August 2025, Bosch acquired the heating and air conditioning operations of Johnson Controls for. In September 2025, the company announced plans to cut 13,000 jobs at its auto parts business, representing 3% of its global workforce, in stages by 2030 as it relies more on artificial intelligence. Bosch won the German Future Prize again in late 2025, for developing a zero-emission fuel-cell power module to power heavy vehicles. The system transforms hydrogen and oxygen to electrical energy, emitting only water vapor, when using green hydrogen.
By 2026, the Bosch Group had almost halved its profits. In Germany alone, more than 20,000 jobs are to be cut by 2030, primarily in the Mobility division.
Business divisions
Mobility
The mobility division is the largest, in terms of revenue. The Bosch 2024 global annual report, showed that this division accounted for 61% of global revenues of. This division creates solutions for vehicles and fleet management, developing software, vehicle electronics, logistics management solutions, driver assistance and safety systems and vehicle energy systems such as thermal performance. The mobility division is active in powertrain systems, but has evolved to include hydrogen storage, electric propulsion, automated driving and connectivity.Since 2022, this division is going through a comprehensive transformation process due to rapid technological advancements that are affecting the sector. Bosch Mobility is developing advanced driver assistance system software, cameras and sensors that they are overlaying with artificial intelligence. In 2025, this divisions production was affected by geo-political decisions that led to exports of Nexperia's finished products being banned, which affected the supply chain of the automotive sector. By December 2025 Bosch Mobility was announcing an AI extension platform, developed with technology partners, that allows existing vehicle cockpit systems to be upgraded to incorporate advanced AI without the requirement to change existing hardware and system infrastructure.
Consumer goods
Consumer Goods contributed 22% of total Bosch Group sales in 2024. The Consumer Goods business division includes BSH Hausgeräte GmbH, which offers energy-efficient, and increasingly connected household appliances. Its products include washing machines, tumble dryers, refrigerators, freezers, stoves and ovens, and dishwashers. Small appliances include vacuum cleaners, coffee makers, and food processors. BSH Hausgerate is the largest manufacturer of home appliances in Europe.The Professional and DIY Power Tools division manufactures power tools and accessories, and measuring technology. This includes tools such as hammer drills, cordless screwdrivers and jigsaws. This division also makes gardening equipment such as lawnmowers, hedge trimmers, and high-pressure cleaners. One of the division's focal points is high-performance cordless tools. In 2019, they were ranked as the largest power tools manufacturer in the world, based on 2018 revenue. In 2025, Bosch announced it would close two of the power tools manufacturing sites based in Germany in 2026 due to economic factors affecting the construction sector and consumer confidence, with production moving to alternative locations to improve efficiency. Bosch is also a manufacturer of electric bicycles, offering motors and systems connected to e-bikes such as batteries, displays, and digital services. The eBike Systems division was established in 2009.
Brands in this sector include Dremel, Siemens, Constructa-Neff, Gaggenau Hausgeräte, and Thermador.
It is noteworthy that Bosch consumer products are sometimes considered best-in-breed, such as evaluation of dishwashers in 2025 where Bosch-brand machines took the top 4 evaluations by Consumer Reports.