Talk:Minol

What does this mean?
"Minol is also the trading name of Minol Messtechnik W. Lehmann GmbH & Co. KG, a utility billing and metering company group operating on six continents." So is this a DIFFERENT company than VEB Kombinat Minol? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.112.49.214 (talk) 22:02, 22 October 2010 (UTC)

'VEB' means 'Volkseigener Betrieb', i.e. a government owned company. This no longer exists after the German government fullfilled the privatisation requirements of the international trade conventions. The 'Messtechnik' (metering technology) is simply a joint venture or daughter which extends their business activities, like a pharmaceutical company would establish a cosmetics company. Metering technology is big business in Berlin where something like 85 % of people live in rented apartments. The landlords charge for water, heating, and hot water but can no longer do it proportionally. Every water tap our outlet has a meter, every radiator for central heating also a meter, so you can see how lucrative metering technology is.

The 1300 filling stations mentioned do not look right to me. Thuringia alone had 400 at the time of the fall of The Wall (mentioned in one court case), so that would proportinally come up to between 2,000 and 2,500. The often read claim that elf Aquitaine bought Minol in 1991/1992 could never be verified, because the sale price has not come to light. It is not likely that there was indeed a sale because the rightful owners of the Minol gas station allottments did not receive a proportinal payment (own experience). 144.136.192.17 (talk) 01:14, 26 September 2012 (UTC)