Automotive supplier looks ahead with optimism after turning a corner

A Rugby manufacturer which supplies some of the world’s largest car companies expects to be able to put its foot gently on the accelerator next year after a year of recovery and new business wins.

Autins Group, which makes noise and heat management products, had endured a tough couple of years which had seen two chief executives leave in just over a year and the group issue a profits warning in summer 2018.

Gareth Kaminski-Cook joined as chief executive in October 2018, on the first day of the group’s financial year, and today Autins has published its full-year results which he believes “provides grounds for optimism for the future”.

Cost-cutting measures removed £1m of costs from the business, and a number of customer wins has strengthened its commercial operations and made the group much less reliant on its unnamed largest customer.

Kaminski-Cook said: “Despite the considerable challenges faced by the automotive industry, decisive management action ensured that 2019 was a year of recovery, repositioning and new business wins.

“We were successful in securing 22 new customers, achieving 14% growth in Europe and delivering a significant increase in sales of the Neptune technology.”

Neptune is an ultra-fine material that is seen as being critical to the company’s future success.

Although there has been “some slippage” in the awarding of contracts from an industry nervous about Brexit and political uncertainty, Autins says its conversion rate is averaging 50% and is upbeat about future demand for Neptune products.

“We have doubled production for Neptune in the year and the enquiry pipeline has grown by 66%,” said Kaminski-Cook.

Although revenues were down 8% to £26.9m, the second half of the year saw only a 1.5% drop, while gross margins jumped nearly seven percentage points in the last six months as the efficiency measures took effect.

A £3.5m equity raise in the summer will partly be used to invest in automation in its Midlands factory with the company in “advanced stages of making decisions” on its investment.

“That will make a really efficient, attractive Midlands manufacturer,” Kaminski-Cook told TheBusinessDesk.com.

The chief executive said he is “very pleased with the progress” in his first year.

“We are more advanced in the really important areas than I might have expected,” he said.

“A year ago we needed to change our direction, to focus on cost reduction and operational improvements. The team have embraced it brilliantly well.”