sia Abrasives centralises activities in England at single location (17/12/2002)
In November 2002 as planned, sia Abrasives relocated the majority of the conversion and distribution operations of its Group company in Saffron Walden to the corporate head-quarters of sia Fibral Ltd. in Greetland. This move concentrates the activities of the sia Group’s two English companies at just one location. The Swiss specialist for surface treat-ment technologies aims to achieve annual cost savings of some CHF 2 million as from 2003 thanks to this consolidation. A number of the operations previously performed at Saffron Walden have been relocated to Poland. This decision represents a further stage in the de-velopment of the Eastern European market.
sia Abrasives (G.B.) Ltd. has relocated conversion and distribution from Saffron Walden to the corporate headquarters of sia Fibral Ltd. in Greetland. This now means that production of sia Fibral Ltd. and conversion operations of both English Group companies are now concentrated in one location. The non-budgeted expenses entailed by relocating production in this way amount-ing to some CHF 2 million are being booked to current operating expenditure for 2002. Con-solidating activities in England has been prompted by economic considerations and creates con-siderable synergies by optimising operational processes. The resultant downsizing by 50 work-places will lead to annual savings of some CHF 2 million. Disposal of the premises no longer required in Saffron Walden is not yet complete. When the planned sale goes through in 2003, we expect to realise a profit to the amount of some CHF 5.0 million.
A small volume of conversion operations from Saffron Walden is being transferred to the sia representative in Poland. sia Abrasives intends this move to lay the foundations for further pene-tration and expansion in the Eastern European market. The Thurgau-based company anticipates relocation of production to Poland to bring about further cost benefits. Optimisation of proc-esses in production coupled with comparatively low levels of wages in Poland will both be mak-ing a contribution towards these reduced costs.
® Correct nomenclature for sia Abrasives Holding AG
As there are other companies and organizations that use the same abbreviation as our company, we would be grateful if you could help to avoid any misunderstandings by always writing our name as follows: sia Abrasives (never just sia by itself).
News 