Member Article

North West success story in a global market

It’s manufacturing focus week on Bdaily, and we’re looking at the debate around the UK sector. Cheshire manufacturer Oliver Valves has achieved rapid growth in recent years – a demonstration of the kudos ’made in Britain’ retains as a hallmark of quality

The challenges facing the UK manufacturing sector are well known and oft-repeated. Chief among them is the inability of most British businesses to compete on price terms with rivals in emerging economies where the cost base is significantly lower.

However, one company proving the vitality of British manufacturing and export is Knutsford-based Oliver Valves, which supplies oil and gas valves to almost all of the world’s biggest energy firms and the contractors that deliver projects for them.

The business was founded in 1979 by Michael Oliver, after he invented a single innovative valve in his garage. The company now employs 350 people around the world and Michael still heads the business today as chairman.

The Oliver Valves family consists of three separate companies – Oliver Valves, which supplies valves for a wide range of industrial applications, Oliver Valvetek, which specialises in subsea valves for offshore applications, and Oliver Twinsafe, which was launched on the back of an innovative new safety-enhancing product incorporating two valves into the same casing.

These companies have defied the economic conditions of recent years to achieve rapid growth. Turnover in the financial year ending 2012 was £65.5 million, up 56 per cent on the previous year, and the company now has the £100 million mark firmly in its sights.

The past two years have also seen the two biggest single orders in the company’s history – a £7.2m order from a major Brazilian energy firm and a £13.2m project to supply valves to three new platforms off the coast of Qatar – both secured by the Twinsafe division.

This has been possible because of the nature of the market in valves that control the flow of oil and gas, where quality and reliability are greater concerns than purchase price – the cost of a valve is arguably insignificant compared to the potential financial implications should it fail.

“Our focus has always been on super-critical applications where reliability needs to be 100 per cent, and this differentiates us from the mass valve-manufacturing market”, says Michael Oliver, chairman and founder of Oliver Valves.

“The reputation we have built in the last 30 years for delivering on-time, within budget – and for our equipment achieving 100 per cent performance – has enabled us to outperform competitors offering cheaper products without the same guarantee of quality.”

Of course, this does not meant that competing for business in over 50 different nations around the world is without its challenges – language barriers, fluctuations in international currency markets and, of course, delivery logistics must all be overcome.

The company’s headquarters – along with its main manufacturing and research facilities – have always been based in Knutsford, and the majority of its products are still built, designed and tested there.

However, Michael Oliver says a local presence in target markets is essential. He explains: “Staying close to customers on the ground is a critical part of our strategy, and our network of overseas sales and support offices has grown rapidly. We now have permanently staffed offices around the world, located in the USA, Brazil, Aberdeen, the Netherlands, the United Arab Emirates, India, China, Singapore Malaysia, Indonesia and Korea.

“We also employ bi-lingual technical staff in Knutsford to cover the key international territories. This way we can be sure that nothing is lost in translation, which is critical when dealing with complex, engineering-led orders.

“It is by getting as close as we can to our customers that we’ve been able to maintain our position in the traditional markets and also to establish a strong presence in developing markets such as South America , which will be increasingly important in the years ahead.”

The strategy is clearly paying dividends, and last year the Valvetek division won a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in the International Trade division in recognition of the rapid growth it had achieved over the previous three years.

The company has no intention of resting on these laurels, however, and the focus is now firmly on delivering continued growth in the years ahead.

“We have always channelled much of our revenue into research and development, and we’ve just invested £700,000 in a 5,300 sq ft facility to house our growing collection of state-of-the-art, custom-built testing equipment.

“Innovation in engineering will continue to be a crucial ingredient in our future success, and our engineers are constantly talking to customers to anticipate their needs and invest in developing a solution ahead of our competitors.”

It’s easy to focus on the challenges that British manufacturers have faced in recent decades, and will continue to face for the foreseeable future. However, Oliver Valves stands as an example of a British business that has outperformed its competitors on the world stage, and its success looks set to continue.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Oliver Valves .