West Midlands manufacturing group marks £75m sales milestone

Its combined efforts have taken sales to £75 million generated directly through the group since its founding.

A significant focus is now on increasing this number to £100 million according to Adam Cunningham, CEO of Muller Holdings and the new chairman, taking over from Brandauer’s Rowan Crozier earlier this year.

The former craft apprentice is a big supporter of ‘strength in numbers’ and believes the group’s ability to share sales opportunities, best practice, stronger purchasing power and manufacturing expertise has been pivotal in helping it withstand economic uncertainty and secure work from overseas.

“We are fairly unique in being able to bring together such a wide diversity of engineering disciplines under one banner,” explained Mr Cunningham. “Our core philosophy is to work together to win new contracts as that is what keeps us all in business and, over the years, we’ve been very successful in doing that.”

He added: “That’s in the past and the focus is very much on the future and looking at new markets which lend themselves to our strengths. Electrification is one of these and we’re leveraging our relationship with WMG to make real strides in this market, whilst alternative powertrains are also presenting a number of new opportunities.

“The other thing I want to pursue under my stewardship is exploring how more member companies can introduce automation and robotics into their processes to increase productivity and competitiveness. This isn’t at the expense of jobs, quite the opposite. If we can work smarter, we can win more contracts and in turn create new positions.”

MAN was established in 2003 using funding from a regional development agency to help combat industrial uncertainty in the area.

When the development agency was disbanded, member firms decided to carry on with MAN, agreeing to self-fund the collaboration and, today, the collective now features Alucast, Barkley Plastics, Brandauer, C-MAC SMT, Grove Design, Kimbermills International, Muller Holdings, PP Control & Automation and Ricor.

The group employs over 1,600 people, offering a broad selection of engineering discipline, including automation and control systems, forging, plastic injection moulding, PCB development, precision machining, product and mechanical systems design, high-volume pressings and welded assemblies.

“Running a manufacturing business can be a very lonely place at times, so to have eight other MDs to share your pain and elation with can be an extremely valuable asset,” continued Mr Cunningham. “We often use it as a sounding board to test out new ideas, to cross train our apprentices and to look at how we can work together to promote engineering and manufacturing to young people. The success of the MAN Design & Make Challenge, involving 12 high schools, is an example of companies tackling the skills agenda head-on.”

Mr Cunningham has been involved in industry since 1980, starting his career as an apprentice at Concentric Pumps before taking positions at Henley Foundries, Robson Precision, Auto Tools and Rubberneck Fittings.

In 2002, he joined Muller Holdings as Works Manager for its Birmingham site, quickly getting promoted to Operations Director and overseeing the consolidation of its manufacturing footprint from the second city to its current base in Redditch.

The former apprentice took over as MD of Muller Redditch in February 2007 and, in recent months, has been appointed as CEO of Muller Holdings, responsible for the group’s ongoing expansion in CNC milling, turning, multi-spindle and CNC/Conventional escomatic manufacturing services.

Manufacturing Assembly Network www.man-group.co.uk