Dormer Tools set to celebrate 100 years as ‘Your trusted partner since 1913’

The company started life as The Sheffield Twist Drill Co. in 1913, and now has subsidiaries in 25 countries. It is part of Sweden's Sandvik Group. The anniversary coincides with two other significant Sheffield anniversaries - 200 years since the birth of Sir Henry Bessemer, who revolutionised the manufacture of steel in South Yorkshire, and the centenary of Harry Brearley's discovery of stainless steel. Simon Winstanley, marketing co-ordinator at Dormer UK, based at the Advanced Manufacturing Park, South Yorkshire, said: "The last 100 years has witnessed previously unimaginable advances in the technological and scientific world: the mass production of motor vehicles, powered flight and space travel, the birth of the nuclear age and the development of the telecommunications industry. "Dormer's products have helped to write the history of this industrial progress and it is here, in the millions upon millions of components that have been drilled, reamed, cut, threaded or otherwise shaped by the company's tools, that the real history of Dormer lies. "There is a certain pride, too, in the fact that our centenary falls at a time when Sheffield is celebrating the achievements of two industrial giants, Bessemer and Brearley." Dormer's history has been interspersed with industry innovations. Back in 1950, for example, the company was the first drill manufacturer in Europe to introduce the Steam Temper treatment, with its characteristic blue finish, to their products. This treatment proved highly successful and received widespread acclaim from the engineering industry. As long as 46 years ago, Dormer was showing its initiative for embracing emerging technologies when it acquired a new computer, leased from IBM, at a cost of £135,000. It needed its own air conditioned room and performed 30,000 calculations per second. And in 1984, the company was one of the first in the industry to make it possible for customers to electronically order products on line at a time when the internet was virtually unknown outside of the academic world. The company, which has adopted the slogan 'Your trusted partner since 1913' for its centenary, has won many accolades over the years, and in 2008 became the first rotary cutting tool company in the UK to receive a prestigious award in recognition of its business standards – the European Foundation for Quality Management.