A corporate acquisition in 2002 brought together direct competitors to remove unwanted elements from beer and commercialize a replacement system for diatomaceous earth.
Engineers at Westfalia Separator AG and Seitz-Schenk, both in the German town of Oelde, began informal discussions a decade ago to see if they could design a replacement for DE by combining the benefits of centrifugal force and crossflow filtration. Coincidentally, a major beer industry competitor of Westfalia Separator AG, Pall Corp., acquired Seitz-Schenk in April 2002. Convinced the new system was the wave of the future, Pall and Westfalia put aside their competitive differences and went forward with the partnership.