So you have been involved as a supplier right from the start?
Yes, but our success is also in part owed to a technical innovation. In the nineteen eighties, the company collaborated with gunsmith Peter Fortner from Rosenheim to develop a rifle with a new lock. Instead of repeating by means of a lever, athletes can use their thumb for quick and simple locking, and their index finger to reopen again. Anyone who has watched a biathlon event will be familiar with this hand movement. The development gave athletes a major advantage in terms of time and today it still gives us an edge over our competitors. At the last Winter Olympics, all the medals were won by athletes who were using Anschütz rifles.
Have there been any further developments to the product since the nineteen eighties?
In terms of the smaller details, a number of changes have been made: updated sights, optimisation of the lock action, options to adjust the stock, and more besides. One thing that has always been difficult for us as an industrial enterprise was the idea of being able to customise our rifles to suit individual requirements, in particular the gunstock. The Bionic stock opens up a whole new way of doing things for us. Using scanned handprints, we print it as an industry-standard series that meets demanding environmental and stress requirements. This is not an innovation, it's a breakthrough.
How did the collaboration with umlaut come about?
umlaut approached us with a prototype. This was the result of a Rookie Challenge, a concept whereby a group of young and talented individuals work together on a specific task. I think it's a pretty cool story in itself. The projects are accompanied by umlaut specialists, so we knew that the idea was backed up by engineering expertise. So we said: we'll take a risk and try it. We then worked together to put the product through the further stages of development until it was ready for series production and agreed on a risk-sharing model for manufacturing. That means we are also now partners in business.