The creation of a new European machine tool group, FFG Europe, was announced at Italy's recent BIMU manufacturing technology show, held in Milan between 2 and 6 of this month. The new group currently comprises Jobs Automazione (Jobs and Sachman brands – milling technology); Rambaudi (milling technology); and Sigma Technology (vertical machining centres). All three companies were already part of Taiwan's Fair Friend Group (FFG), the maker of Feeler brand machining centres sold in the UK by the Engineering Technology Group, Southam, Warks. (See article <a href="http://www.machinery.co.uk/machinery-news/fair-friend-buys-five-machine-tool-firms-in-italy-japan-and-south-korea/39894/" target="new"> here</a>.)
The new company's shareholders are: Alma Srl (an Italian company run by the entrepreneur Luigi Maniglio and Jobs management), with a 40% relative majority share, plus minority shares held by companies that are part of FFG and other Asian investors. FFG Europe's headquarters are in Milan and the holding is run by Jobs personnel – its chairman Luigi Maniglio and CEO Marco Livelli.
Taiwan's Fair Friend Group (FFG) includes over 60 companies. It operates in leading industrialised and emerging countries and has a turnover of $2.5 billion. Its machine tool division posted sales of $1.3 billion USD in sales and takes in over 25 production facilities, mainly located in Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, China, USA and Italy, with a total of 19 brands. In the machine tool sector, the FFG Group is a partner in joint ventures with Mectron (China), Takamaz (China), F.T. Japan (Japan), EMC (Japan) and Takeuchi (Japan).
Jobs, Rambaudi and Sigma posted a €60 million turnover last year and aim to achieve a total of €80 million this year. FFG Europe intends acquire other Italian and European companies in the high-tech machine tool sector, with the aim of achieving a turnover of approximately €200 milion within the next three years.
The establishment of the group has three main goals, according to the official release are:
1) Technologically advanced industrial centre - The new FFG Europe platform is a benchmark industrial centre in the technologically advanced machine sector, which brings together excellent European industrial companies with important potential for development and further success on an international level.
2) Integration with FFG - market internationalisation/process globalisation - the integration with Fair Friend Group (FFG), a major global industry player with large goals for further expansion on various markets, is a fundamental step for exploiting the synergies between the very high level technological know-how of the sector's European industrial platform and the strong penetration in markets where FFG holds a leadership position. In particular, FFG Europe's growth strategy will be driven by the superiority of its technological value and innovation of European machine tools and production systems in a context of market internationalisation and process globalisation.
3) Growth - the growth of FFG Europe will be accomplished both through internal actions, by expanding the activities of the brands with new products and new applications on unexplored markets, and through external actions, thanks to further additions of European manufacturers in the high-tech machine tool sector.
