UK based Bodycote the world’s largest commercial heat treater and the only truly global heat treater has just released their 2021 Preliminary Financial Results which can be found in their entirety at The leading provider of heat treatment and specialist thermal processing services worldwide – Bodycote plc The basic summary directly from the Bodycote website is included below.
Highlights Results;
- Revenues up 7.1% at constant currency to £615.8m (organic revenues up 5.2%)
- Headline operating margin at 15.4% (2020: 12.6%) §
- Free cash flow of £105m
- Closing net debt1 of £52m
- Final ordinary dividend 13.8p, total year 20.0p (2020: 19.4p)
Strategic Progress;
- 2020 restructuring programme completed, with permanent cost savings of £20m delivered in 2021
- Incremental £10m of permanent cost savings to come in 2022
- Emerging Markets’ revenues up 17% at constant currency
- Specialist Technologies’ revenues up 7%4 , outperforming Classical Heat Treatment
- Strong margin improvement anticipated as revenues grow
Commenting, Stephen Harris, Group Chief Executive said: “We saw good progress in 2021, with margins increasing to 15.4%, as Bodycote benefited from strong recovery in general industrial markets and completion of the restructuring programme. The results also highlight the progress we are making in our strategic focus areas.
“As we moved into 2022, General Industrial continued to perform strongly, and Civil Aerospace growth has accelerated. Bodycote’s Automotive business continued to be impacted by supply chain disruption for our customers, but signs of improvement are evident. And while we expect cost inflation to persist, we will continue to manage its impact on the business. In summary, the Board expects further progress in 2022, but remains mindful of the current geo-political and macro-economic landscape. “Looking further ahead, the outlook for the business remains positive as we benefit from high profit drop through on revenue growth across all our market sectors.”
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Amidst all the doom and gloom in the world these days it can be easy to forget that many businesses continue to grow and prosper-commercial heat treater Thermal Vac out in California is a good example. Almost exactly one year ago we posted the update below about the company. Their name comes up today because work is progressing on their brand new Arizona location (as can be seen in this photo) and every day that goes by brings them a little closer to opening day.
“February 2021; Commercial Heat Treater Thermal Vac Making Substantial Investments; In 2020 we ranked commercial heat treater Thermal Vac as one of the largest commercial heat treats in North America https://themonty.com/project/l
For over three decades we have been sought out by customers who require the most innovative solutions for challenging project needs, effectively helping to secure a position as a leader in the industry. With an original facility of 5,500 square feet and 11 active customers, Thermal-Vas transformed into a multiple location company with over 60,000 square feet of campus footprint. We have 80 team members, with 50 in production. Thermal-Vac is a family-owned business with second generation family leaders heading the business since 2012. Our team is comprised of many family-oriented relationships with over 25% of our employees being related to each other in some way.” https://www.thermalvac.com/
Since that article the company has been very busy-lets summarize a little;
- Sean Driscol, President of the company and son of the founder Steve Driscol was recently named President of the new location “Thermal Vac Arizona”. While this location is still a work in progress we do know that it will include a shiny new vacuum furnace.
- The facility in Orange, CA has added a new salt bath.
- On the way is a brand new Gasbarre nitriding furnace.
It’s always great to see a family owned business transition from first generation to second generation and in the case of Thermal Vac the transition seems to be going smoothly.
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Specialty Heat Treat, Inc. is a family owned business and was founded in 1993 by Tom Moore in Houston, TX. SHT operates a 100,000 square foot facility on 9 acres and has grown to 42 furnaces up to 25’ in length. Customers include small machine shops, steel warehouses, OEM’s, and forgers almost exclusively servicing the oil and gas markets. Since 1994, furnaces have been in operation 24/7 with the exception of a few hurricanes.
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The graph below shows extreme volatility for spot nickel pricing in just the past few days. It appears to be a given that for a number of reasons nickel demand will be increasing for the next number of years which will put upward pressure on pricing but how much pressure is the question-your guess is as good as ours.
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It was just announced that Birmingham Fastener in Birmingham, Alabama, USA had acquired K-T Bolt in Katy, Texas an announcement which caught our attention at “The Monty Heat Treat News”. Regular readers will know it caught our attention because of the fact that heat treatment of fasteners represents a significant percentage of the total heat treating market worldwide. In this case K-T Bolt has long maintained an in house heat treat department which includes Surface Combustion “Super 30” Batch IQ equipment.
“Manufacturer/Distributor Birmingham Fastener Acquires K-T Bolt in Texas; Katy, TX-based K-T Bolt Manufacturing provides custom fabrication, closed-die forging, in-house heat treating and electropolishing.
BIRMINGHAM, AL — Birmingham Fastener announced March 9 the acquisition of K-T Bolt Manufacturing, Inc. based in Katy, TX.
“With over 100 years of combined fastener production, this acquisition strengthens Birmingham Fastener’s product offering and manufacturing diversity,” the company said. “Most importantly, it allows us to add teammates to our world-class staff and will yield long-term benefits for our customers. In doing this, the level of service we can offer to our customers will be increased.”
K-T Bolt Manufacturing provides custom fabrication, closed-die forging, in-house heat treating and electropolishing. With this partnership, Birmingham Fastener and its sister companies can expand product and service offerings to their customers. Randy Peck will stay on as President of K-T Bolt and join the leadership team at Birmingham fastener, offering his expertise in the field.
“The future of our company is now and always will be about growth and productive changes. At the same time, we must hold fast to our core values like world-class service, accountability, and a commitment to excellence that we’ve had since my father founded this company in 1980” says Brad Tinney, President and CEO of Birmingham Fastener. “This partnership allows us to further expand our footprint and strengthen our commitment to American fastener manufacturing.”
Founded in 1980, Birmingham Fastener is a domestic manufacturer and distributor of fasteners for structural steel fabrication, metal building manufacturers, water works, OEM, and MRO. The Birmingham Fastener family of companies consists of multiple locations across the nation to service our valued customer.”
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In Nuevo Laredo, Mexico we find Linamar Driveline Systems a division of Canadian auto parts maker Linamar, one of the largest captive heat treaters in North America as rated by “The Monty Heat Treat News” https://themonty.com/project/a
by Tier One supplier Visteon before it was bought by Linamar a number of years back. Interestingly enough this location had one of the largest vacuum carburizing installations in North America at one point in time which included two large ECM systems purchased in 2010.
The company is gracing our pages today because they have just invested in some more new heat treating furnaces. This photo shows the first furnace, a batch IQ furnace with working dimensions of 36″ X 48″ X 36″, with top cool option and ancillary equipment which was provided by AFC-Holcroft.
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Earlier this week, March 7 to be exact we had a story about Aichelin, one of the world’s largest furnace builders investing in a brand new manufacturing facility close to their Slovenian division “Bosio”. This story can be found at Furnace Builder “Aichelin” Makes Major Investment in New Location-Plans to Shift Some Production | The Monty
To go with this story we have these photos showing the cornerstone of the new building being laid by the principals of both Bosio and Aichelin. In the first photo you see Zdravko Počivalšek, Minister of Economic Development and Technology Slovenia, Bojan Šrot, Mayor of Celje, Hugo Bosio, founder of Bosio Furnace, Mr. Peter Schobesberger, CEO of Aichelin.
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Texas Heat Treating offers a wide range of heat treatments, testing and support services, operating 24 hours a day and seven days a week. CEO C.H. “Buddy” Crossley started Texas Heat Treating in 1977 as a small company in a 6,000 square foot shop. Today, the company has expanded to two large facilities, the first in Round Rock, Texas, and the newest plant in Fort Worth, Texas. We serve customers in the southwestern region of the United States and Mexico. With over 40 years of experience, we’re committed to professionalism, quality and on-time deliveries. We continually invest in modern equipment to ensure we can provide our customers with the highest-quality service. For more information about Texas Heat Treating, visit our website.
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For a variety of reasons including the war in the Ukraine the price of nickel futures escalated so much today that the London Metal Exchange we forced to suspend trading in nickel contracts, only the second time in history that this has occurred;
“LONDON, March 8 (Reuters) – The London Metal Exchange (LME) has been forced to suspend all trading in its nickel contract after prices went into chaotic overdrive. LME three-month nickel , the primary pricing reference for the global physical supply chain, hit $101,365 a tonne early on Tuesday, up from just $30,000 on Friday. The contract was suspended at $80,000 as the exchange stepped in to halt trading at 0815 GMT. All Tuesday’s trades up until then will be cancelled until further notice, the LME said.”
We and everybody else in the heat treat industry should be extremely concerned because of how this will affect the price of every single alloy component used in furnaces, fixtures, base trays, radiant tubes, mesh belts-all with feel the pain and it will be felt quickly. Just today a large commercial heat treater in the US told us that when they asked their long time basket supplier for a quote they were told that because of the volatility in pricing that they were unable to quote at the present time.
These graphs really demonstrate how quickly things have changed.
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We have long considered John Hubbard to be one of the most successful commercial heat treaters of all time-his accomplishments in the industry are legendary (to learn more about John we would suggest his “Heat Treat Podcast” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H76BJtd6QsM). According to this press release John has decided that now is the time for him to retire from the Board of Directors of “Thermal Process Holdings”, the 11th largest commercial heat treater in North America as ranked by “The Monty Heat Treat News” https://themonty.com/project/5
“March 7, 2022; Thermal Process Holdings (“TPH”) has announced that John Hubbard P.E. has retired from its Board of Directors. Mr. Hubbard said: “Following the acquisition of Rockford Heat Treat, it is a good time for me to step away from the business. I’m proud of the platform we have established, including the acquisition of five companies, and wish the team continued success.”
Todd McDonald, CEO of TPH, commented: “It has been a real pleasure to work with John over the past several years. His experience and knowledge of heat treating is second to none, and I have benefited tremendously from working with him.”
ABOUT THERMAL PROCESS HOLDINGS; Thermal Process Holdings, Inc. owns and operates six heat treat locations: Rockford Heat Treat and Diamond Heat Treat (Rockford, IL); Certified Heat Treating (Springfield, OH); Hudapack (Elkhorn and Franklin, WI); and P&L (Youngstown, OH). The company’s stated goal is to build a diversified, professionally managed thermal processing business generating over $100 million of revenue by providing differentiated value-added services. Central to this strategy is identifying and bringing together businesses that share a focus on safety, quality, service, and advanced technology.
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