New | Troubled German gunmaker Heckler & Koch takes aim at US for sales

From the town that has armed Germany since the 1800s, Andreas Heeschen is fighting a very 21st century battle. The antagonists include regulators and bondholders.

At stake is control of Heckler & Koch, an iconic brand of military and police weapons that descends from Mauser, which made rifles for 19th century empires and later for the Nazis.

Confronting declining sales and creditor concerns, Heeschen, H&K's owner, has a plan to turn the tide: tapping into Americans' love of firearms.

"We are pushing big time there," Heeschen said. He needs to expand in the US because the authorities in Berlin have restricted exports to the Middle East. They have also questioned the reliability of one of its top-selling products, the standard issue G36 assault rifle used by the German army since 1995.

The decline in sales has squeezed company finances, sending its bonds tumbling and pushing it into borrowing at 10 per cent to make interest payments of 9.5 per cent on other debt.

Heeschen, 54, bought H&K in 2002 from British Aerospace, now BAE Systems, with Keith Halsey, owner of English gunmaker Boss & Co. The company is perhaps best known these days for supplying the rifle that may have killed Osama bin Laden.