Mark Jones, who’s been at the helm of the company these past two decades, says resilience is the steel industry’s secret weapon, and in the next decade the industry needs to focus on tackling big issues.
Uncertainty dominated 2019 and resulted in 2020 Q1 growth forecasts downgraded to 0.3, from 0.6, due to both the UK and global outlook. However, Jones believes that uncertainty and change will become the norm across the business world as the sands shift towards different practices and behaviours. For industries like steel, this thinking means developing a readiness to adapt and evolve two things that the sector has, traditionally, been slow to do.
“From the need to reduce environmental impact, skill shortages and the transition to smart factories, including widespread automation, we are on the brink of deep-seated change,” says Jones. “The peaks and troughs of the past 20 years have given the steel industry a resilience which we can use to our advantage, but we must pay attention to the lessons learnt.”
Alongside backing from parent company Ficep SpA in Italy, Jones and his team have created several strong partnerships with complementary manufacturers, enabling them to offer a wide range of steel processing machinery to the UK market. In addition, the company’s extensive UK showroom facility can be used for customer training and product demonstrations, and houses a large spare-part facility to minimise downtimes for fabricators.
“It’s fantastic to celebrate our 20th anniversary at MACH, a show which has been the highlight of our calendar for many years,” concludes Jones. “I’m delighted to say that 2020 is set to be our busiest year yet for machinery orders, and we will be continuing to bring new and updated machines to market, to improve the productivity and processes of our steel processing clients.”
