Insight

“There have been so many key points during these fifty years, but to make a long story short we can say the integration of the Valbruna Group in 2003, a brand new and future oriented plant that opened in 2008, and the ISO TS 16949 certification obtained in 2012 are the main ones. Each of them enabled UGIVIS to make a great step forward.

Being a cold drawn wire manufacturer has always given us a particular position in the market. Our speciality is the stainless steel wires for cold forming. We supply to our customers the same material we use internally. We can assist and help them to choose the best compromise between deformation capacity and cost efficiency. Thanks to our manufacturing capabilities we are able to supply stainless steel drawn wires from 1.2mm up to 16mm – offering a wide range of grades, coatings and packings. Our technical department is also able to assist our customers by using our cold forming simulation software and thanks to the support of the Acciaierie Valbruna technical and quality staff we can provide additional assistance to our customers.

Being based in France means that we in the perfect strategic position to deliver all over Europe in a short lead time. Most importantly, it is vital that you speak the same technical language as the customers and when it comes to cold forming we know what we are talking about.”

“Security, quality and traceability are critical factors when producing products and it is something we take very seriously. An important part of this is having reliable partners. That’s why we are very demanding of all our suppliers (raw material, tooling makers, surface treatment, heat treatment, secondary operations, etc). We have issued a Suppliers Guide, which highlights our philosophy and of course all our requirements. We also run regular audits and performance tests on our suppliers products and services.

Being part of Acciaierie Valbruna, which is involved in aerospace, nuclear, oil and gas, automotive, medical and other high demanding industrial sectors, has also given us the tools and the ability to guarantee the same level of quality to our customers. We also have the very latest IT systems (ERP and CAPM – Computer-Aided Production Management) that are fully optimised to ensure a high-level of traceability.”

“We need to be always prepared for high demands. For me the key point is the training of our people. We are investing a lot in professional training to boost the professionalism and the skills of our staff. It will help us to anticipate the future needs of our businesses.

We are also open to all innovations our suppliers can offer. It is essential that as a business you are on a constant quest for innovative solutions. That is why we closely monitor technological developments – so our customers can always benefit from the latest developments.

UGIVIS is also involved in prospective studies with French professional associations and scientific committees. For a small company like ours it is a strong commitment, but we need to be ready for customers’ new challenges.”

“Customers are requesting high performance components made with top quality materials, which has a deep impact on our activities. Our fasteners and cold forged parts are more and more complicated and require secondary operations (machining, grinding, tapping, etc) but also heat treatments, surface treatments, plus special lubrications.

Regarding our wire supplies, they must be able to support heavy deformations; help our customers to keep a high productivity level by reducing their tooling consumption; and always be cost effective.

For the future I won’t speak about potential markets but about materials. I think stainless steels have a great future. In a world where we hear more and more talk about sustainable development, stainless steel is the perfect material – long lasting, recyclable, and still competitive.”

“As I said before we always need to be prepared to answer customers’ demands and customers have a lot of imagination. Seriously speaking, the industry must stick to the trend of the new technologies. The Internet has changed the business and the relationship between customers and suppliers. Now it is so easy to find a new supplier, to buy in one click, to send an enquiry all over the world within a few seconds. The industry must adapt to these new technologies to facilitate customers’ needs and offer new experiences. In the future it will make the difference.”

“It will certainly impact the relationship between the supplier and the customer. Transparency, connectivity, real time information and additive manufacturing will be the keywords within a few years. It is a real challenge for a small company to adapt its production facility to these future standards. It requires heavy investments in IT systems and manufacturing machines. Of course old fashioned industries will remain but they will struggle with a short future.

For the fasteners industry, as a manufacturer, my main concern is the additive manufacturing. It is now possible to produce reliable and cost efficient prototypes or small series but what about big volumes! Sooner or later it will be possible. I am really focused on this topic.”

“The current situation of the fasteners industry is good. Almost all the actors (distributors and manufacturers) are reporting sales increases and profit growths. Thanks to the automotive industry, which is still doing well. Building and construction is recovering in Europe and the general industry is in a good shape.

In the short term our main concerns are the raw material prices and the lead time. The mills have a huge order portfolio and insufficient capacity. The result is price increases and longer delivery times. It means for us bigger safety stocks (raw materials and finished products) to avoid shortages and then a deep impact on our cash flow.

Despite the end of anti-dumping taxes we are not overwhelmed by Chinese products yet. Perhaps because the prices are not as competitive as we expected them to be for quality products.

Last but not least, the consolidation in the fasteners industry should continue. These last months we have seen several acquisitions and mergers both from distributors and manufacturers. Everybody is chasing new opportunities to grow up. In our mature and cyclical market, external growth is easier than internal growth.

For our fasteners division our plans and challenges are mainly focused on complex parts made with special materials (precipitation hardening grades, duplex, super duplex and heat resistance grades). We are also developing top quality carbon steel parts, which is new for us. It is a strong request from our customers who intend to buy all their products, and not only stainless steel parts, from us.

We are also working with some of our customers to help them to fight forgeries and fake items. Forgery doesn’t only affect luxury watches, hand bags or purses but also industrial products. We are developing fastenings systems to ease the detection of fakes.

Regarding our cold drawn wire division we have ambitious targets for the European market. We intend to double our activity to promote our skills on wires for cold heading. We want to become the leading reference in the European market.”