The relationship
between captive and commercial heat treaters is a reflection of culture
and industrial market maturity. The biggest commercial shops are in USA,
Europe and Japan - the three oldest and most mature economies. Companies
in these countries out-source parts and processes that are not part of
their core competencies. Experts (Bodycote, Aalberts, etc) can perform
this function more cost-effectively because of lower labour rates,
insurance, pensions, medical, dental, etc. What all of this means is
that the largest commercial chains in the world are in all cases based
in these three areas.
The list that we have compiled below is not 100% correct in terms of
order but it does give you some indications of the largest commercial
heat treaters in the world. We start off by looking at a number of
different areas around the world we will generalize as to which areas
are strongly captive and which areas are strongly commercial. Our
personal feeling is that the next large growth area for commercial shops
will be Korea.
Korea, a
strongly captive market.
China, is
virtually all captive heat treating although we are just starting to see
the birth of commercial shops.
India, captive
although with very strong growth in commercial shops.
Australia / New
Zealand, a mixture of both captive and commercial however with all
due respects to those "down under" this is a very small heat treating
market.
UK, Spain, Germany,
France, Italy and most of Europe. Probably the strongest commercial
area in the world with the market dominated by the two giants in the
industry, Bodycote and Aalberts. Commercial shops are generally thought
to represent about 20% of the overall heat treating market.
Eastern Bloc,
Captive
Africa and Middle
East, small and captive.
South America. A
mixture of both captive and commercial with the largest market, Brazil
now dominated by Bodycote's recent acquisition of Brasimet, the largest
commercial operation in South America.
Taiwan. Both
captive and commercial, with a number of small to medium sized
commercial shops which are typically family owned.
Mexico-up until
now virtually all captive heat treating, however as we recently pointed
out in a series of articles we did about Mexico this is changing with
very large growth in commercial shops.
Canada/USA, a
mixture of both captive and commercial shops with commercials
representing approximately 10% of the overall market.
1) Bodycote International.
Without a shadow of a doubt UK based Bodycote is the largest
commercial heat treater in the world and generally the largest in
each geographic area around the world. Overall sales are in the
order of $1 Billion US which includes "Testing" and "Hipping"
although heat treating sales are roughly 75% of Bodycote's overall
sales. If you feel the inclination, a browse through our archives (a
long browse) will give you a lot of Bodycote's history. A browse
will also give you a good feel for where they are going, namely
expansion into new developing markets. You can see their financials
and locations at
www.bodycote.com
2) Nihon Parkerising.
It would appear that the second largest commercial shop in the world
and the largest in Japan is Nihon Parkerising who have commercial
heat treat sales of roughly $280 million USD almost all of which is
salt heat treating based on the former Degussa Tennifer (MELONITE)
technology. In addition they have huge sales of salt. Staggering
that a commercial heat treater does such volumes in such a
specialized area.
3) Aalberts Industries.
Based in the Netherlands Aalberts is the second largest commercial
heat treater in Europe. This large conglomerate is split into two
parts, Industrial Services (under which their heat treating
companies fall) and Flow Control. While the second largest in Europe
they have a very small presence in North America and virtually no,
if any heat treating presence outside of Europe and NA.
http://www.aalberts.nl/showpage.asp?docid=210 Aalberts
heat treating sales are about €280m (at the time of printing this
would be about $375 million USD) but this is split roughly 50/50
between commercial heat treating and Anodising/electroplating which
means heat treat sales of approximately $187 million USD.
4) Bluewater Thermal.
(previously Gibraltar Industries). Again another large conglomerate
US based Bluewater Thermal is clearly the second largest in North
America with sales of about $120 million USD. They are best known
for their individual companies such as Brazing Concepts, CCHT, B & W
Heat Treat, Harbor Metal Treating, Hi Temp Inc., Pennsylvania
Industrial Heat Treat, Rock River HT and SCM Metals. All of these
shops were part of the heat treating division of Gibraltar
Industries based in Buffalo, NY until the heat treating operations
were bought by a private equity group in June of 2006 and the name
changed to Bluewater Thermal.
www.bluewaterthermal.com
5) DOWA in Japan,
Thailand and the USA.
Dowa is one of the giants in the industry both when it comes to
commercial heat treating and building new furnaces. They have
numerous heat treatment facilities in Japan and operations in
Thailand, USA and others as they tend to follow Toyota and Honda.
(1) Dowa Holdings Co., Ltd. consists of five member companies such
as Dowa Metals & Mining, Dowa Eco-Systems, Dowa Electronics
Materials, Dowa Metaltech and Dowa Thermotech.
http://www.dowa.co.jp/index_e.html USD90 to 70m
range One which certainly deserves to be on the list is Dowa
Thermotech who had 2005 sales of $193 million USD for their new
furnace business and commercial heat treating division. Our belief
is that roughly 60% of total sales are commercial heat treating
which would mean $115 million USD.
6)
The HEF Group.
HEF is a European based company that describes itself as a ‘surface
engineering company’, (HEF is a French acronym meaning “wear and
friction”). They provide surface treatment technologies – chemicals
and/or equipment - and commercial processing in the areas of liquid
nitriding, sulfurizing, carburizing/heat transfer salts, boriding,
PVD/CVD, etc. Estimated sales for their heat treating and PVD
business is a little over $100 million USD.
http://www.hef.fr/A02.HTML
7)
ONEX.
Again another Japanese commercial heat treat chain. They do not have
a presence outside of Japan and do not appear to have an interest in
doing so. Our understanding is that commercial heat treat sales for
ONEX are a little under $90 million USD.
http://www.onex.co.jp/Mains1/onex-e2.htm
8)
TOHKEN THERMO TECH CO. LTD.
One of the largest commercial heat treaters in Japan with a number
of locations in Japan, one in Thailand and one in Malaysia. By
anybody's standards a very large, well established heat treater that
has been around since 1927.
http://www.tohken.com.my/company.htm Overall sales
for the company as a whole are between $70 and $80 million USD.
9)
RIKEN.
This Japanese manufacturer of piston rings also builds furnaces and
does a great deal of commercial and captive heat treating. In 2006
their sales were $771 million USD and we believe their commercial
heat treating sales to be between $60 and $70 million USD.
http://www.riken.co.jp/e/index.html
10)
Paulo Products.
US based Paulo Products is the largest of the privately held
commercial heat treaters in North America, long owned and run by the
Rassieur family
www.paulo.com
They currently have 5 plants pretty much covering most types of heat
treating including Batch IQ furnaces, vacuum and continuous to name
a few.
August 2007
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