Member News

Welding – excuse the cliché – is in Jason Elias’ blood. Raised by a blacksmith/welder father, Elias took up the torch at 12 and went on to an apprenticeship at Transfield Services (now Broadspectrum), before founding Precision Metal Group (PMG) at the beginning of the millenium. Elias is passionate about nurturing welding skills, and his company’s tag line is “servicing a dying trade with a new generation.” It’s not just welding at PMG, but the varieties of welding they handle are many: orbital, sub arc, pulse, robotic, and more conventional methods. Chasing growth through different kinds of projects has also led the NSW-based company to amass a long list of certifications, each of them important in proving they’re up to the job as a supplier. The company’s two decades of growth, which saw its headcount reach a high of 52 in March, have been, according to Elias, the result of “chipping away and … just adding more and more services over the years”. “Clients have seen the need…

From baked bars, nut bars, muesli and granola and cereal-style bars, to raw fruit and nut snack packs, dried fruits, nuts and baking products – you will find products manufactured by Tasti Foods on most supermarket shelves throughout New Zealand and Australia. Now in its third generation, Tasti Foods remains proudly New Zealand-owned and -operated. The company began life back in the 1930s when two friends decided to start producing crystallised ginger. Fast forward more than 80 years and a workforce of over 250 staff now produce a whole range of food products, as well co-manufacturing for a number of internationally recognised brands. The company also supplies nearly every supermarket chain in Australia and New Zealand with private label snack bars. Operating an efficient manufacturing facility Tasti has always manufactured in New Zealand and has been…

A machining workshop seeks to produce a certain number of parts, at a required level of quality, in the most efficient way, delivered on time. Traditionally, manufacturing businesses defined efficiency by return on investment. Success was measured in terms of continuous runs of thousands or hundreds of thousands of pieces and maintaining steady output from one or many machines was the goal. From that point of view, a machine that was running and making parts was considered efficient. Today, manufacturers more frequently carry out low-volume/high-mix production scenarios tailored to varying customer needs. Lot sizes may range from hundreds of pieces to single digits. However, even when all the machines in a shop are running non-stop, customers nevertheless could still be waiting for parts they ordered. High-volume output strategies conflict with the flexibility and complex planning requirements of low-volume production scenarios. While…

Based in Highett, Victoria, Ronson Gears was established in 1954 by Melbourne engineer Ron New. Ronson’s current Managing Director - Gordon New - commenced his career as a cadet at Robert Bosch Australia before a stint working and travelling in Germany and Europe. A mechanical engineer, he returned to Australia and joined the family business in 1976. Today the company manufactures gears, associated power transmission components and proprietary gearbox assemblies for a range of customers and industries. Ronson could be regarded as a ‘traditional’ manufacturer, as gears themselves are indeed a ‘traditional’ mechanical component. Dating back to hundreds of years BC, gears are among the oldest equipment known to mankind. Originally carved by hand, the first mechanical machines built specifically to cut more accurate gear profiles date back to the 19th Century, when English inventor Joseph Whitworth patented the first gear hobbing process in 1835. So how do businesses like Ronson transition from such deep ‘traditional’…

Triple Eight – also known as the Red Bull Holden Racing Team – is an Australian motor racing team that competes in the Virgin Australian Supercars Championship, Australia’s premier motorsport category. Parts inside Triple Eight cars need to be structurally fit-for-purpose and durable enough to endure the harshness and vibration that come with racing. High temperatures inside the cars can exceed 65 degrees Celsius. During racing, these cars reach speeds in excess of 300kph and generate g-forces up to 2.5 times gravity. In early 2017, EVOK3D, a Melbourne-based 3D printing solutions company and HP partner, visited Triple Eight’s workshop to show HP Multi Jet Fusion (MJF) parts. “We were blown away with the part quality and strength, compared to what we were used to,” said Mark Dutton, Race Team Manager at Triple Eight. “We realised we needed to have access to this technology to improve a whole host of components”. This aligned with a broader discussion with HP and resulted in a joint partnership with EVOK3D, HP, and Triple Eight. The…

Many manufacturers and suppliers supply goods to customers on retention of title (ROT) terms ROT security interests must be registered on the Personal Property Securities Register (PPSR) If a registration is not made, and the customer enters insolvency or defaults, a supplier will have no claim to recover unpaid goods supplied on ROT terms The COVID-19 pandemic brings a heightened risk of insolvency Recent legislative changes give suppliers a longer window of opportunity for the registration of security interests in goods supplied on ROT terms Goods supplied on ROT terms It is common for manufacturers and suppliers in many Australian industries to supply goods to their customers on ROT terms. This means that while the customer takes possession of the goods, the supplier retains legal ownership of the goods until they are paid in full. Since the introduction on the Personal Property Securities Act 2009 (Cth) (PPSA), a supplier can only enforce its rights to goods supplied…

AMT: Tell us a little bit about Sheet Metal Solutions (SMS) and what you do. Luke Williams: We provide sheet metal cutting and bending services to a wide variety of businesses and within various industries. We service agriculture, engineering, construction, mining, architectural, transport and trucking SMS has been in business since 2007. We received our first TRUMPF laser in January 2010, which is when I joined. I’ve been working with lasers and programming ever since. While originally I was thrown in the deep end at the time, I do love working with the laser technology. Over the past ten years I’ve received extensive software training on-the-job and acquired the skills to run the machines for the greatest productivity. I also schedule the work for the bending machines and help run the entire factory’s production. AMT: How has the company evolved over the years? LW: Over the past 10…

Times are tough in Australia’s – and the world’s – manufacturing sector. In the current COVID-19 pandemic crisis, we’re all trying to balance our need for preserving cash versus investing in capital infrastructure to get through and be ahead in the recovery beyond. However, given that the lead times for ordering and deploying large machines is long, we cannot always afford to delay. To illustrate this, here at Sutton Tools we are working on some very large projects in Europe that called for further capital expenditure to increase our capacity to deliver. In March we received a $1m thread grinder from SMS in Germany that is already in production making automotive forming taps for South-East Asia and Europe, and is proving very effective. Despite the crisis, we are still receiving orders for these types of products. In April a large Indonesian subsidiary of Honda ordered 3,000 automotive forming taps – and that order will go straight onto that machine. Investing to compete For Sutton Tools, as an Australian manufacturer up…

On 25 March, the Government effected changes to the Corporations Act to protect the economy from the stress of the ongoing pandemic. Understanding these changes and what hasn’t changed can help you protect against: Being held personally liable for Company debts incurred, and Losses from trading with insolvent customers and on Director / Shareholder Loans. What has changed? Relief from insolvent trading Relief has been provided to Directors who act in good faith from insolvent trading claims for the period of six months from 25 March 2020. Insolvent trading is the act of incurring debt whilst the company is insolvent, and this debt remains outstanding at the point of liquidation. A liquidator can bring an action against a Director personally for these debts. An example of how the relief will work in practice is: We have Jim who runs a chain-link fencing manufacturing business with expenses in the form of rent, wages and wire. Jim’s company becomes insolvent on 1 April 2020; however, he keeps trading until 31 December 2020 when his…

AMT: Firstly, tell us about Bosch Australia and the business’ activities. Gavin Smith: Bosch Australia is the representative subsidiary for the Bosch group in Australia and New Zealand. The company here has been around in one form or another trading since the early 1900s. The company’s grown in different directions, but it literally does a little bit of that which Bosch does everywhere. We operate across four sectors: mobility solutions, consumer goods, industrial goods, and building & energy technologies. Some of our businesses are the leaders in their field and large in scale, others are small and relatively new to our portfolio. But we have a team of about 1,300 people across Australia and New Zealand. Our turnover is just under a billion Australian dollars this year. And we are still a significant manufacturing and engineering location for the Bosch group in the areas of vehicle safety and comfort electronics, and we import and trade the…

With over 40 years’ industry experience, Genis Steel manages all aspects of steel fabrication from on-site measuring, in-house drafting, fabrication, through to full site installation. With extensive in-house capabilities and state-of-the-art facilities in both Melbourne and Adelaide, Genis Steel is able to provide a range of steel construction components for domestic dwellings, architecturally designed projects and multi-level apartments right through to industrial, commercial and government projects. Genis Steel recently expanded into South Australia, opening a state-of-the-art fabrication facility at the Lionsgate Business Park in Elizabeth South. This large facility, which was once home to Holden’s press shops, boasts over 15m clear heights and a 100-tonne lifting capacity. Combined with Genis Steel’s technical capabilities, workmanship and reputation for quality fabrication, the scale of the facility will enable the company to handle an almost unlimited scope of work. Coregas worked closely with Genis…

With the use of network communication, new digital technologies combine physical manufacturing systems with virtual worlds of knowledge and 3D modelling. The target is significantly increased output, but as manufacturing systems considerably improve their intellectual features and decision-making capabilities, they necessarily become more complicated and more expensive. Minimising the downtime of such systems is a ‘must’ for the development of every system component such as machine tools, workholding devices or cutting tools. Cutting tools can not only cut metal but also cut downtime, depending on their design concept. Assembled cutting tools with exchangeable cutting heads from cemented carbides are very common in metalworking today. Two decades ago, there were very few systems built on an exchangeable head principle. Now, practically every leading cutting tool manufacturer has this type of system in its product range. Advances in tool grinding and resharpening machines have…

While William Buck’s FRAA division has been operational for some time, it is significant to a wider range of businesses in the current environment given the regulatory changes, tax breaks, and widespread restructuring resulting from the global pandemic. FRAA advisors are available to assist CFOs and financial controllers to listed public, unlisted public and private companies on the proper implementation of Australian Accounting Standards (AASB) and the Australian equivalents to the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS). FRAA will also assist with complex accounting matters such as impairment testing, business combinations and share-based payments. The service line can also assist with the preparation of general-purpose financial reports for public interest entities to allow CFO’s and financial controllers to concentrate on operational matters rather than annual compliance. With 13 years’ experience and strong insights across a broad range of industries and markets, William Buck’s Director Alan Finnis leads the FRAA division. Finnis said the FRAA team assists companies to understand the ‘real-life’ implications…