Entrepreneur Ursula Ida Lapp celebrates her 90th birthday

Ursula Ida Lapp is one of those who created the economic history of Germany. Together with her husband Oskar Lapp, she created a world-famous company with courage, vision and incredible creativity. She has transformed LAPP into a global market leader in integrated cabling solutions. On May 30, 2020, the successful entrepreneur will celebrate her 90th birthday in Stuttgart.

LAPP’s success story began in the late 1950s. Ursula Ida Lapp's husband Oscar Lapp (1921-1987) was a brilliant inventor and craftsman. In the late 1950s, he developed the first industrially produced connection and control cable, which revolutionized interconnection technology. Previously, all cores in cables were black or gray, making it difficult for electricians to correctly label the wires at the appropriate ends when connecting them. This required a labor-intensive process known as ringing. In addition, the cables had a very large cross-section and were not very flexible. Oskar Lapp invented a cable with colored cores of much smaller diameter. The first industrially produced connection and control cable was born. This was accompanied by another innovation: the couple found a suitable name for ÖLFLEX® brand. Even today, the brand is still synonymous with oil-resistant and flexible control cables throughout the world.

In 1959, the Lapp couple founded their company with the help of a bank loan of 50,000 marks. Since Oskar Lapp was still working for another company Ursula Ida Lapp herself entered the commercial register as the founder of the company. The company name was created at the kitchen table: U.I. Lapp KG - U.I. stands for Ursula Ida. Like many other startups today, Lapp initially ran their business from the garage of their home in Stuttgart-Vaihingen. Oskar Lapp took over sales management, Ursula Ida Lapp took care of accounting, orders, advertising and small children at home. She often drove to the train station with her cart to receive newly delivered cables, which entrepreneurs originally had custom-made, and ship the cables to customers. ÖLFLEX® was the right product at the right time. The Lapps thus set quality standards that are still in force in cable production today. They even offered ready-made cable assemblies, the cables of which included up to 130 colored cores. The demand was huge.

Already in 1963, the first in-house plant for the production of ÖLFLEX® cables was opened. In 1965, the company’s headquarters were moved from the family home in Stuttgart-Vaihingen to Schulze-Delitzsch-Strasse, which remains the company’s headquarters to this day. When Oskar Lapp died in 1987, management of the company passed to Ursula Ida Lapp and her sons Siegbert and Andreas. The internationalization process continued. New subsidiaries have been opened and new jobs created in Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa and recently in Australia.

Today LAPP is a leading supplier of complete solutions and branded products in the field of cable and connection technologies. The company’s product range includes standard and highly flexible cables, industrial connectors and cable glands, customized system solutions, automation and robotics technologies for smart manufacturing, as well as accessories. LAPP’s main market is the industrial equipment and mechanical engineering sector. Other key markets are the food industry, as well as the energy and automotive sectors. Since its founding in 1959, LAPP has remained under continuous family ownership. In the 2018/19 financial year it generated consolidated revenue of 1,222 million euro. LAPP currently employs approximately 4,650 people worldwide, has 18 production sites and approximately 44 subsidiaries, as well as approximately one hundred partners in other countries.

Ursula Ida Lapp is still actively involved in the life of the company. She is the honorary chairman of the supervisory board and attends important company events. Already at the end of the 1990s, she handed over the daily business operations to her sons Siegbert and Andreas Lapp. Today Andreas Lapp is Chairman of the Board of Directors of the management company of the holding company Lapp Holding AG, and his brother Siegbert E. Lapp is Chairman of the Supervisory Board. Two grandchildren have already taken on responsibilities in the company. Mattias Lapp assumed the position of the CEO for Europe, South America, Africa and Middle East regions in 2017. Alexander Lapp is responsible for digitalization and e-commerce in the company. This was also one of Ursula Ida Lapp’s goals: the business remained in family ownership and the third generation would continue to work in the company she created.

Ursula Ida Lapp has always been a brilliant example of what characterizes the company’s culture today: customer focus, family focus, innovation and success. Sustainability and employee responsibility have always been at the forefront of her mind. UrsulaIda Lapp knows from personal experience how important it is to be able to combine family and career. For example, U.I. Lapp GmbH was awarded for its work with people and its focus on different situations in an employee’s life, since LAPP supports employees at all stages of their lives, allowing them to reconcile work and family life thanks, for example, to flexible working hours.

LAPP also provides support in finding a nursery or kindergarten for the children of its employees, and participates in numerous health programs. For this reason, Federal Ministry for Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth named LAPP the best family-oriented company in Germany.

Ursula Ida Lapp has always been passionate about social and cultural initiatives outside the company. In addition to generous donations to institutions in and around Stuttgart, as well as in India, she and her sons founded the Oskar Lapp Foundation in 1992. It was founded in honor of her husband Oskar Lapp, who died of a heart attack. The Foundation offers additional incentives for young scientists to participate in cardiovascular research. The Oscar Lapp Research Prize of 12,000 euros is awarded annually. The Oskar Lapp Scholarship is also awarded every two years and is worth up to 20,000 euro. The realization of the Möhringen community center was also only made possible thanks to a generous donation of 600,000 euros. Ursula Ida Lapp also spent four years in the regional parliament.

Ursula Ida’s grandson, Matthias Lapp, described her contribution to the company as follows: “Our grandmother, this is the company”. For her achievements as an entrepreneur as well as for her social activities, Ursula Ida Lapp received numerous awards, including the Federal Cross of Merit and the Order of Merit of of Baden-Württemberg.