Coventry manufacturer expands

It’s all systems go for a Coventry manufacturer that is exporting around the world.

Atritor, which is based on the Blue Ribbon Park, supplies processing equipment to a range of industries across the globe including mineral, chemical and food processing sectors.

More than 95 per cent of its trade is overseas including Western Europe, USA, South America, the Far East, Malaysia, Indonesia and New Zealand.

The company has also recently launched a recycling division and, as well as growing its traditional area of business, it has helped to grow turnover by 30 per cent over the past two years.

Atritor’s growth has seen them grow to nearly 40 staff and has also had a positive knock-on effect for local suppliers, including Warwickshire IT firm ACUTEC, which has been called in to upgrade the company’s server and systems.

ACUTEC has also improved the company’s secure VPN system because so many of the business’s staff operate from overseas due to the high volume of exports.

Director John Wilkinson said: “When I joined the company 22 years ago, the company was firmly focussed on export even then and around 70 per cent of the business was overseas.

“That has grown to being around the 95 per cent mark now and that has helped to insulate the business from the recession. We’ve grown all through the downturn.

“We’ve recently launched a new recycling business and that is growing both domestically and internationally.

“With growth also comes investment and we felt that the time was right to upgrade all of our IT systems and ACUTEC came very highly recommended.

“Like most businesses, we rely very heavily on IT – nothing is done on paper any more – most enquiries come in through the system.

“Most our trade comes from word of mouth too so when a company comes as highly recommended as ACUTEC did from such a trusted source, I tend to act.”

Chris Roche, the managing director of ACUTEC, said he was delighted to be working with Atritor.

He said: “Like Atritor, we have grown significantly over the past couple of years and we are looking to continue that.

“We are certainly seeing a rise in business from the manufacturing and engineering sector and it would certainly suggest that the sector is improving.

“Atritor also bears out the idea that trading overseas is a route to growth and we are very pleased to be working with them.”