That performance represents a 60% increase on the same period 12 months ago, with the majority of the new contracts focusing on the firm’s DIGILOG family of touch-probe systems.
The Burton-upon-Trent company is now looking to build on this positive start to the year by increasing its work with SME subcontractors through the appointment of Paul Hodgkinson as dedicated technical sales engineer for the UK.
Managing Director David Mold says: “With all the uncertainty around Brexit, I was half expecting the first quarter to be extremely tough, with investment decisions put on hold. We’ve actually seen the opposite.
“New orders have been placed by both the dealer network and also end user customers, with interest coming from clients involved in automotive, aerospace, medical and nuclear sectors. Whenever there is a need for repeatable quality, accuracy and quicker turnaround times then we have the answer.
“I think it’s fair to say DIGILOG and its ability to measure ‘in-machine’ is proving extremely popular and we expect this range of probes to be our best sellers in 2019.”
Hodgkinson brings with him an extensive network of contacts and more than 11 years’ experience working in industrial automation and the machine tool sectors. He will be responsible for working with the sales team to better understand the requirements of subcontactors and the support they require to make the most of the Blum-Novotest technology.
“This is a very exciting time to be joining and I’m looking forward to helping the team increase the pipeline of possible sales across all of our target sectors,” Hodgkinson says.
“My job will be to get to know the pain points of SMEs and how we can use our solutions to help them improve manufacturing performance, speed and quality. There’s already a number of potential firms who have never used our products before that are keen to find out more.”
