We are pleased to be representing a new customer for drop and upset forgings in steel based in the West Midlands.
Our customer has a long successful history in this market specializing in low and medium volume forgings up to 100Kgs in weight.

How things change! Up to October of this year we were looking at full order books and a record year for many of our customers. The worldwide recession, largely brought on by the folly of the Banks’ lending policies over a number of years has really hit home. The saddest part of any recession is the impact on people’s lives and livelihood. Our customers have been hit like many throughout the world and we have lost around 300 jobs throughout our customer base.

In spite of this we have continued to win new business as prototypes (automotive) and also a new casting destined for a transmission application in high volume. In addition we have regained safety critical casting work for the railway industry in Germany. Ben Dills continues to have success in his role here and we are very confident for the future.

The £/€ exchange rate gives us a large advantage at present. We are very well placed in the UK to benefit from an upturn in the world economy when it occurs. Any company which is not positioned to take advantage of this in the coming months will face a very difficult future. Expocet offers companies an excellent vehicle to take advantage of this situation in the short, medium and long term but is is depressing to come across UK manufacturers still who export very little and who will not commit themselves to attacking this obvious and lucrative market.

Frances Tonks (Fran), known by all for her friendliness and warmth, has finally hung up her computer and phone and retired at the end of December 2008. We will miss her greatly and hope she will keep in touch very often. Fran started as an employee at Expocet over 7 years ago but is now simply a friend! She has given great service over these years and we all wish her well in her retirement. Our best wishes go to her husband Malcolm and her son Phil as well as to her elderly parents with whom she will now be able to spend more time. Thank you Fran for all you have done here at Expocet! We look forward to your cartoon montage of life at Expocet shortly!!!

Once again we all met at the local Chinese Buffet in Wolverhampton and had a great time – if not (personally!) a little too much food!!

All at Expocet wish our customers a very successful 2009!!!

The first half of 2008 has again been very successful for Expocet with new major automotive business won in France. There are plenty of projects where we are fighting for business on behalf of our customer base. The market is very buoyant in the foundry industry particularly, but energy and raw material prices continue to be a problem.

Martin visited China in May again this year.

He revisited our old friends in the already well established foundry in Shandong province. The new automotive foundry is very impressive and as always the welcome was extremely warm and the meetings very constructive.

Martin also spent a short time at our new Chinese partner near Shanghai.

These two foundries produce excellent Investment Castings and provide a great partnership together with our Investment Casting Foundry here in the UK. We continue to provide castings to many varied industries both produced in the UK and by our Chinese partners.

Martin also visited  1.2 (China) Ltd  offices in Shanghai. Thanks again to Alex, Forrest, Michelle, Kelly and Lena for their help over the last few years. It was great to meet and discuss possibilities of extending the partnership between Expocet and 1.2 (China) Ltd on Tooling and Aluminium Pressure Diecastings in the future.

As we reported in January of this year a new extension has been planned by one of our clients to increase the capacity of SG, Grey Iron and ADI. The planned investment will increase capacity by around 30%

There has been good progress in the building work and installation despite the occasional bad weather.

The work should be complete in November 2008 and the foundry will come on production stream in January 2009. There has already been great interest in the extra capacity we can provide – not least because of the high quality and service we provide consistently.

Ben joined us here at Expocet in February this year as previously reported and is settling in well after his intensive training programme.

He has spent time at each of our customers’ sites and has really got “hands on” with some of the processes. We would like to thank all our customers for the time spent with Ben over the last few months during his training period. We are already seeing some great results from his work in a relatively short space of time.

Also a new experience for Ben was visiting a manufacturing exhibition in February with Fran. The large halls and exhibitors of the Leipzig manufacturing exhibition were most impressive. The visit to the DRUPA Exhibition in Düsseldorf also provided some new potential customer leads.

Ben continues to rapidly gain knowledge of the industries we are involved in.

We also wish Ben and Laure every blessing for their forthcoming wedding in October!!!!

November 2007 heralded  a set of new opportunities within the Railway Industry in the USA.
Martin arranged a “whirlwind” trip over 5 days. Despite horrendous weather conditions  and an errant SatNav
(arriving at one hotel stop at 1.45am!!)

Our intrepid travellers Andy and Martin enjoyed both the trip and the success in bringing back meaningful enquiries and major new business.

A wonderfully positive sign from one of our clients is their decision to invest a huge €17 Million in new plant and equipment!!! A new horizontal foundry will be opened, which will increase our capacity by over 30% and secure new jobs for an additional 80 people. This is an indication of the continuing success and commitment of this foundry producing all grades of SG, Grey Iron and ADI. The new plant will cover every aspect of manufacture from casting (mould size 750 x 550 x 225/225) and processing. In addition to this, our machine shop is expanding significantly with a second site opening during 2008 with further investment in new machining equipment. It is a challenge we at Expocet relish to bring in new business to this world-class foundry which offers a service second to none!

Business levels with Daimler AG have grown significantly in 2007
and are set to expand even further in the coming 12 months.

Our involvement with a leading EGR manufacturer continues to expand.
It is pleasing to know that Expocet will contribute  in a small way to
the reduction of the Automotive Industry “footprint”.

We have had to wave goodbye to Amöne Jovetic who left us just before the Christmas holidays and we would like to wish her all the best for the future.

Expocet welcomes Benjamin Dills who will begin working at Expocet in February. Having gained a degree in European Business Law and International Management in Germany, Ben is ready to launch into his new career and make a huge life change by moving to the UK. Fluent in German (no surprise there!), English and with an excellent working knowledge of French, we are confident that Ben will prove to be a major asset to Expocet and our customer base both in this country and abroad. He will start an intensive training programme at our customers’ sites in the middle of February 2008.

"Children in Need" came around again this year and Expocet was happy to participate
in the fundraising. Louisa from MTT was “arrested” on 17th November 2006 after “riding her
horse” over the speed limit in Wolverhampton. Ruth Badger (of apprentice fame) came along to do the arresting
in the Expocet office, and along with Expocet’s contribution a total of £700 was raised to ensure her release.

 MTT have continued to provide us with outstanding translation services this year along with Alchemy Translations.

Nihau!! May and June saw the exciting visits to China by our MD Martin Thomas. Our Chinese partner welcomed Martin and colleagues with a large banquet and traditional Chinese entertainers. The trip turned out to be a great success - although Martin hasn’t quite got the hang of the Chinese language yet!!

We have a high security lock on test in Germany and have made presentations in France with a high level of interest in the medium and long-term.

Marc Cottrell settles in as a valuable member of the team and still gets to make the tea! His own choice of drink (Wilk or Red Bush) is not Martin’s favourite!! Marc concentrates on the Spanish and French markets and has obtained new “hydraulic”  business in France this year.