June 30, 2025 Sparking Innovation

Volume 28 | Issue 2

Innomotics is a leading global provider of electric motors and large drives in sustainable electrical solutions across industries.

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For more than 150 years, Innomotics, formerly a subsidiary of Siemens AG, has set the pace for innovations in industrial efficiency, electrification, sustainability, and digitalization. According to a company spokesperson, establishing Innomotics as a separate company benefits both customers and the future growth of the company. “It offers the optimal framework for Innomotics to respond more quickly to rapidly changing market conditions. We create added value for our customers through clear business structures and a reduction in administrative expenses.” Indeed, within just two years of being spun off from the Siemens Large Drive Application unit, Innomotics is already a worldwide-recognized brand.

The company’s five business divisions offer a wide portfolio of motors, drives, solutions, classical, and digital services for reliable, sustainable motion solutions that make Innomotics the number one global market leader, the backbone for reliable drive technology in industry and infrastructure worldwide.

“The Innomotics portfolio of high quality and energy-efficient low-voltage and high-voltage electric motors, medium-voltage drives, tailor-made solutions and extensive customer support is used in a wide range of industries, including oil and gas, mining, water and wastewater, food and beverages, cement, and chemicals,” notes a company spokesperson. “Together with our partners, we support our customers everywhere choosing the right products to implementing them into the production environment.”

The company is headquartered in Nuremberg, Germany, and employs around15,000 people worldwide. Annual revenue exceeds €3 billion. With 17 production sites and a comprehensive sales and service network in 49 countries, Innomotics has a well-balanced global presence in a growing market.

There are two major manufacturing hubs in the United States:

• New Kensington, Penn. – The center of development for the globally leading Perfect Harmony medium voltage drive that is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year. More than 25,000 Innomotics Perfect Harmony Drives operate on every type of motor across all continents. “We currently offer the fifth generation,” a company spokesperson says. “That means we have improved the drive continuously in the past while maintaining its core features to ensure that while we implement meaningful innovations, we still offer a solution that is highly reliable.”
• Norwood, Ohio – Historic 125-year-old factory, known for producing industry-leading AboveNEMA motors, high voltage motors that exceed the standard power ratings set by the National Electrical Manufacturers Association. These motors are used in challenging heavy industrial applications requiring voltage ranges from 460 to 13,200 volts.

Sustainable Efficiency

Innomotics is at the forefront of providing products and services that help companies transition to more reliable and efficient energy technologies. “The sustainability trend is driven by the need to increase efficiencies in production processes and avoid rising costs due to carbon taxes worldwide,” says a company spokesperson.

One way Innomotics is addressing this trend is by offering customers turbine replacement. In many industries, production processes are still driven by steam or gas turbines powered by fossil fuels such as natural gas, oil or coal. By replacing these turbines with electric drives, customers reduce carbon emissions and save on maintenance costs drives in existing systems with electric drives. The downtime in operation to replace fossil fuel turbines with electric drives is usually limited to about four weeks.

An example of a major turbine replacement project was with Repsol, a Spanish multinational energy and petrochemical company based in Madrid. iBy replacing a steam turbine with an electric system (Innomotics GH180), Repsol was able to reduce its energy consumption by 25% and thus lower its CO2 emissions by 68,000 tons per year. The Innomotics solution delivers 8.25 megawatts of power. This corresponds to the daily electricity consumption of a small town with 3,000 inhabitants. The new system offers an availability of 99.9 percent and a service interval of six to seven years.

Over the years, Innomotics has continuously improved the energy efficiency of its motors to help companies reduce energy costs and energy consumption, and at the same time improve production processes. To that end, Innomotics recently announced adding to its product portfolio permanent magnet motors of the most advanced energy efficiency class IE6. These motors are characterized, among other things, by 20% less loss compared to IE5 motors. These magnet motors with a power factor close to 1 are available in power sizes from 0.37 kW to 250 kW at 1500 rpm and 3000 rpm.

Pumping Heat

Increased demand for heat pumps is another area driven by the need for greater sustainability. Fossil fuels still dominate industrial heat generation, accounting for over 70% of industrial process heat. Electrifying these heat processes can significantly reduce industrial CO2 emissions and save energy.

Industrial heat pumps can provide process heat up to 200°C, ideal for many applications such as drying processes in the food and paper industries or steam generation and distillation in the chemical industry. Additionally, industrial heat pumps can be used to supply large buildings (e.g., factories, office complexes) or entire residential areas with sustainable heat.

Innomotics partnered with energy producer ENECO to implement the largest heat pump in the Netherlands. It extracts heat from the wastewater and feeds it into the city of Utrecht’s district heating network. This system uses 65 million liters of wastewater daily to generate 25 to 27 megawatts of heat output. It supplies sustainable heat to over 20,000 households, covering about 15% of the total heat demand of Utrecht and its surroundings. Innomotics supplied 8 Perfect Harmony GH180 and 9 A-Compact Plus to the heat pump manufacturer Johnson Controls, which manufactured the overall system for ENECO.

Most recently Innomotics received an order to supply 11 water-cooled HV M high-voltage motors and GH180HC medium-voltage converters from Piller Blowers & Compressors GmbH. The motors and converters are used in machines for the world’s most powerful industrial heat pump system at BASF’s headquarters in Ludwigshafen.

Going Digital

Another way to improve efficiency is digitalization. The Innomotics Inspire IQ digital platform enables industries to monitor and maintain production processes 24/7. Together with a Perfect Harmony GH180 motor equipped with a Smart Cell System,the Inspire IQ platform offers comprehensive cloud-based monitoring capabilities such as thermal monitoring, arc detection, and environmental condition analysis. Overall, Innomotics Inspire IQ can optimize the operation of motors and converters, reduce maintenance costs, and further increase the lifespan of the products.

Additional Internet of Things (IoT) capabilities are provided through modules that connect motors and drives to cloud-based monitoring. The Connect 500 and Connect 600 modules are easy to implement for an installed base of all kinds of motors.

NEMA Membership

Innomotics is a proud member of the National Electrical Manufacturers Association (NEMA), a leading organization that sets industry standards and advocates for the electrical manufacturing sector. According to a company spokesperson, “NEMA membership underscores our commitment to delivering high-quality, reliable, and innovative solutions in electric motors and large drive systems. Our products consistently meet industry-leading standards for safety, performance, and compliance, providing our customers with confidence in their reliability. It also grants us access to the latest technical standards, market insights, and regulatory developments, ensuring we remain at the forefront of industry innovation.

“Active participation in NEMA allows us to contribute to the development of industry standards and policies, ensuring that our expertise and customer-centric perspective help shape the future of the industry. This engagement reaffirms our dedication to redefining reliable motion for a better tomorrow, leveraging industry expertise, and continuously enhancing value for our custom.

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