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York: another brick in the wall
Page 24
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• York Trailer Holdings has bought out French trailer manufacturer Titan as "the final brick in the wall of the company's pan-European basin", says managing director Jim Davies.
The long-established French firm joins York's other key manufacturing bases in Italy, the Netherlands and Scandinavia. In the past month York has also taken over the Australian suspension manufacturer Sinclair and the Dutch rental firm Task BV.
Trailer units
Titan specialises in the manufacture of heavy-duty trailer equipment, supplying trailers to the UK, the Netherlands and Italy, as well as Africa and the Middle East. Based at Le Creusot, between Paris and Lyon, the company produces some 2,500 trailers a year.
Davies explains: "France is the largest trailer market in Europe so we wanted a major player there."
York's plans for Titan include pushing up its production to 4,000 units a year within 18 months. Davies also aims to extend Titan's product range to include vans, curtainsiders and reefers in a move designed to grab some of French market leader Fruehauf s 70% market share.
The 16,000m2 factory at Le Creusot will also become the home for the Piacenza Thermostar, which was launched at the Turin Motor Show and will
handle any overflow production of Italian subsidiary Piacenza's TIR tilt and tipper models. Piacenza (bought by York for some £6.5 million last July) plans to display a dry-powder tank barrel on a York chassis at next month's Tankcon.
The deal also gives York an outlet in Spain as Titan owns a Spanish trailer builder which makes Titan trailers under licence. Based in Zaragoza, Talleres Cimasa manufactured agricultural trailers before linking up with Titan.
"Spain is a market which excites us in the medium term," says Davies, "but before we enter the Spanish market we want to consolidate Titan and fully develop our French operation. Ideally we will start to push into Spain in the early 1990s."
Only a limited amount of Titan products will be imported into the UK. Davies says the company plans to concentrate on components such as axles, hydraulic hoists and low loaders: "Low loaders will be brought into the UK, but we are in no great hurry and components will be imported first. Even if we sold 20 low loaders a year in Britain we would be securing a significant market share," says Davies.
Flexible
The company has yet to decide if these low loaders will be fitted with TEC axles. Davies stresses that York will be "intelligently sensible and flexible" when looking at components.
The Titan acquisition is only part of York's drive for a European base. Davies says spreading the company's interests throughout Europe helps protect it from a downturn in the UK market — he predicts that UK trailer sales will fall by more than 40% in 1989 to about 11,000 units.
Meanwhile other European markets are booming. Davies reports that York's Danish company is doing particularly well, and by the end of the year York should also be the second largest trailer manufacturer in Holland.
York is building more than 10,000 trailers a year: by the end of 1990 that figure will be boosted to 12,500 a year. The company is also watching for other potential acquisitions.
Davies says: "We are looking at other companies, especially in France, as Titan will be an excellent umbrella for further additions."
Rotation
York Trailer Holdings was bought out from Bunzl by a management bid last summer. The company plans to be floated as a pan-European PLC with sales of 2160 million at the end of 1990 or the beginning of 1991, depending on financial markets and results. 0 York is now building 100 Super Cube trailers with raising roofs for a leading trailer rental company. The trailer firm developed the Super Cube two years ago with Ford in a deal worth 28.5 million.
0 by Tanya Cordrey