Velux, Rockwool, Icopal and H+H may well be considered among the world leaders within their businesses. All four have very substantial market shares, all four have pioneered remarkable technological breakthroughs and all four have Danish origins.

In an historical perspective, Denmark cannot boast the same level of manufacturing traditions in this and other sectors as can its larger neighbours, Sweden and Germany. Nonetheless, these four companies contrived to carve out substantial individual niches during the latter half of the last century.
      A Danish cluster for building components did not exist until the 1950s when these four companies transformed themselves into international groups. Up until then, Denmark, like many other countries, was mainly engaged in production for the domestic market.
      The expansion of the building materials industry was promoted by several factors, not least of which was education.

The Technical University of Denmark (DTU) and other Danish engineering colleges played a key role by providing well-educated engineers within disciplines that were relevant and important to the companies in their growth phase.
      DTU was also a training ground for public servants in state and semi-state bodies like the Danish Building Research Institute and the Danish Building Information Centre. The fact that these bodies were staffed by highcalibre individuals with a technological background was instrumental in ensuring that Denmark has relatively high standards for buildings with regard to energy, fire, moisture and mechanical requirements.
      In my own family, a DTU education is somewhat of a tradition – my grandfather, father and I, all graduated from there. But although none of us ever worked directly with technology, our DTU education has helped us to better understand technical matters.

A second important element in the growth of the building industries sector is the enormous residential building boom in the 60s and 70s as well as the energy crisis in the latter decade. Maybe the Danish boom was stronger than in other countries because mortgage interest was tax deductible and Denmark had well functioning mortgage institutions. Furthermore, private-sector residential building was supplemented by a substantial amount of social housing.

Danish role models for international expansion within the construction industry were in the first half of last century a number of Danish engineering companies such as Christiani & Nielsen, Kampsax and Højgaard & Schultz. These companies benefited from the advanced know-how within statics which professor Ostenfeld and other professors at DTU developed. The bridges and harbours these companies built in many countries around the world added prestige to the construction and civil engineering spheres which in turn attracted more talent into the sector.

Also F.L.Smidth, the Danish engineering company selling cement factories in all parts of the world, serve as a role model for building materials producers. My father, in fact, worked in a technical department at FLS a few years after the war, and this gave him knowledge about how an international corporation could be organised.

The final explanation for the emergence of the building components cluster has to do with human capital. The founders of all four companies possessed unusually high levels of entrepreneurial skills and the colleagues they recruited to join them were highly talented. This skills pool enabled them to identify market needs and trends and to satisfy that demand by improved technology.

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