Gesellschaft für Unternehmensgeschichte mbH

© Linde AG
No one who is not sufficiently familiar with historical facts and possesses an appropriate historical sense or so-called historical experience can hope to understand the economic phenomena of any given time period, including the present.

Joseph A. Schumpeter
In June 2012, GUG e.V. founded a fully-owned subsidiary called GUG mbH. Thus, the society’s non-commercial commitment could be clearly separated from its commercial activities. The GUG mbH is a limited company through which enterprises gain access to the same contact persons and competent advisors that serve in a non-commercial function. The GUG provides quality control at the highest level for business history research through its academic advisory board and professional project management with many years of experience.

GUG does not write simple chronicles. Rather, our studies answer scientific questions. Scholars analyse themes from the core of commissioning enterprises and present the results in a well-researched, yet suspenseful and appealing form.

Furthermore, the GUG can offer a comprehensive spectrum of services from a single provider. It designs historical concepts and feasibility analyses; looks for and accompanies authors; researches source material; drafts contracts; creates cost estimates and project plans for its clients; chooses fitting publishers and accompanies book presentations and other events. Furthermore, the GUG advises on all questions in the areas of business history, archives, historical exhibitions, and/or museums.

In accordance with the wide definition of corporations in modern research, our services are not exclusive to classic enterprises like family firms or public companies, but our field of research includes other corporations as well, e. g. associations, co-operatives, and institutes.
The basis for all historical research and history communication is the corporate archive. The GUG supervises the establishment of archives until they are fully operational. We employ a highly competent team whose members are chosen and continuously trained in co-operation with the Association of German Corporate Archivists. A company’s core records are archived in order to ensure legal certainty and to preserve the historical heritage. Unsorted files are archived professionally. Plans for the secure and reliable preservation of today’s digital communication are developed in order to keep them available for tomorrow’s historical requirements. We are committed to the concept of sustainable archiving that ensures accessibility in the future.

GUG mbH began its activities in 2012 with the marketing history of Gerolsteiner Brunnen GmbH & Co. KG and historical studies on a number of firms: Munich’s municipal utility company, Krauss-Maffei AG, Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung and Deutsche Telekom AG. Furthermore, company archives are built or extended at, among others, Gerolsteiner Brunnen GmbH & Co KG and Linde AG. GUG mbH also advised Kurtz Ersa Group on the establishment of its “hammer museum”. GUG mbH currently supports projects at numerous enterprises.

The GUG mbH implemented a pilot project with Canadian SIERC shortly. The goal of the cooperation is to offer management workshops based on research on the history of the company to gain experience in order to develop sustainable future strategies. Since this is not part of GUG mbH's core competence to date, it has joined forces with SIERC experts, who in turn can draw on GUG's expertise in the field of analysis and historical communication (
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