Starting now, Herbert Stephan KG belongs to Germany’s innovation elite, having been certified as one of the TOP 100 companies.
Our gemstone manufacturing company was awarded the TOP 100 prize on June 23, 2017 by Ranga Yogeshwar, Prof. Dr. Nikolaus Franke and compamedia. In the course of an exacting scientific selection process, SMEs from all over Germany were examined and we stood out thanks to the management and success of our innovations.
Top-Innovator 2017
Strategic reorientation is the key to success
By entering the luxury goods sector, we accomplished an important strategic reorientation. The related boost to our reputation within the sector drew the attention of other well-known customers. “More and more customers are beginning to appreciate our qualities. Especially when it comes to the more sophisticated products, we have now become the first source to contact for many large companies around the world,” said Bernd Stephan in Essen.
“The success of our gemstones is due to the hard work and commitment of our 205 employees. We rely on flat hierarchies and short communication channels. In addition, our weekly meetings between department heads and management offer an ideal framework for developing and discussing new ideas,” Bernd Stephan added.
The award to Herbert Stephan KG now makes our qualities as innovation leader officially evident. And we are very proud of that.
TOP 100: the competition
Since 1993, compamedia has been presenting its TOP 100 award to SMEs that demonstrate particular innovative power and above-average innovation success. Prof. Dr. Nikolaus Franke has been in charge of the scientific selection process since 2002. Prof. Dr. Franke is the founder and chairman of the Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation at the Vienna University of Economics and Business and a guest researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). His eighteen research awards and more than 200 publications make him one of the world’s leading innovation researchers. The mentor of the TOP 100 is science journalist and TV host Ranga Yogeshwar. Partners to the project are the Fraunhofer Society for the promotion of applied research and the SME association BVMW (German Association for Small and Medium-sized Businesses). The media partner monitoring the comparison of the companies is manager magazine.
