Arvato

Geschichte

Arvato is a global services company headquartered in Gütersloh, Germany. Its services include customer support, information technology, logistics, and finance. The history of Arvato goes back to the printing and industry services division of Bertelsmann; the current name was introduced in 1999. Today, Arvato is one of eight divisions of Bertelsmann, the media, services and education group. In 2016, Arvato had about 68,463 employees and an overall turnover of 3.84 billion euros.HistoryEarly years of ArvatoBertelsmann was founded as a publishing house by Carl Bertelsmann in 1835. In the following decades, the company grew steadily. After the Second World War, it developed from a mid-sized business to a large enterprise. To meet the demand from the book club Lesering and the record club Schallplattenring, Bertelsmann massively expanded its warehouse and shipping capacities in the mid-1950s. In 1959, the Kommissionshaus Buch und Ton was established to make the production and service infrastructure available for other publishing and printing companies. Bertelsmann benefited from this due to economies of scale. A punch-card index at the Lesering headquarters was acquired from Lufthansa, which later became the basis for the information technology expertise of Arvato. During the first years, Reinhard Mohn was the sole owner of the Kommissionshaus Buch und Ton. In 1968, the company became part of the newly-founded Vereinigte Verlagsauslieferung (VVA). Its purpose was the delivery of printed materials and records "in the name and on behalf of its clients."