International rescue Amdac Carmichael

INTERNATIONAL INTERNATIONAL

RESCUE RESCUE As the only UK company producing a full range of firefighting and rescue vehicles, Amdac Carmichael is returning to the market-leading position it has enjoyed throughout much of its history. Emma-Jane Batey spoke to sales director Brian Wiggins about how the company is benefiting from its extensive investment programme.

Amdac Carmichael has been operational in a number of guises for more than 160 years, with a common thread of technical production running through its history. Today, the UK-based global company is working hard to overcome the challenges of a complicated ownership issue during the 1990s and is already seeing very positive results. A producer of a full range of firefighting and rescue vehicles, Amdac Carmichael’s head office is located in Worcester in Central England, where its dedicated customer service department is also based.

Until the early 1990s, Amdac Carmichael was a family-owned business, with an excellent reputation for reliable firefighting vehicles developed over years of hard work. Following a change of ownership, the company saw a series of corporate complications due to new foreign ownership in 2004, which had a negative indirect effect on the implementation of plans for both development and careful maintenance of the strong Amdac Carmichael brand and facilities.

New owner, new focus

Although the challenges were much publicised in the industry, sales director Brian Wiggins is clear that the new foreign ownership of the company, which was instigated in 2008 and continues strongly today, is allowing it to steadily return to its market-leading position. Mr Wiggins told Industry Europe, “Our new owner has a majority share, with the previous owner having just a 25 per cent share and no operational interest. This means that we have the financial investment and the commercial support we need to return Amdac Carmichael to our previous position as the best-known producer of firefighting and rescue vehicles in the UK, with customers in the four corners of the world.”

Amdac Carmichael has been able to use the positive benefits of the change in ownership to invest right across the business, with its product development, customer service and technical facilities all gaining considerable funds. The company’s experience of the global recession was largely positive, with it retaining a full order book throughout 2008 and 2009, even though many of its

clients saw a capital expenditure drop of at least 25 per cent.

The main sector in which Amdac Carmichael is active is the international airport industry, with many of its firefighting vehicles purchased for use at airport terminals. While the sector certainly took a major knock during the recession, the fact that Amdac Carmichael is also active in the petrochemical and defence sectors, and exports to more than 80 countries worldwide, has meant that its fortunes have continued to rise throughout this difficult economic time.

Mr Wiggins continued, “We found that many airports needed to put resources into security, or simply cut back, so the life expectancy of their fire safety vehicles was stretched. But as we continued to be buoyant in other sectors and geographical regions, we were not really affected.”

Expanding facilities and production

The majority of the Amdac Carmichael product portfolio is produced at its well-equipped plant in Worcester, with plans to expand the facilities and production capabilities quite significantly over the next 12 to 18 months. The best selling product in the range is the Cobra2 airport firefighting vehicle, which is a purpose-built and designed vehicle that is used throughout the airport sector worldwide. The Cobra2 is backed up by a range of second-tier products under the Viper brand name. The standard Amdac Carmichael products are based on renowned automotive brand chassis, with the Cobra2 chassis bought from the company’s joint venture in China following the acquisition of intellectual property from a chassis manufacturing company.

As a specialist in firefighting and rescue vehicles and providers of support products such as aerial hydraulic platforms and airport crash trucks, Amdac Carmichael also supplies products to the industrial petrochemical and defence industries. The company is dedicated to meeting the very strictest of regulations, whether they come from the Civil Aviation Authority or the UK Ministry of Defence, which is a long-term major customer.

As Amdac Carmichael continues to benefit from its investment programme and its reputation for excellence in production and customer service is rapidly returning, the company is increasingly confident in the future. Mr Wiggins concluded, “We expect to see continual, steady, organic growth both in terms of our geographical coverage and our product portfolio. We will be introducing a new airport fire truck within the next two years and we are working to expand further in our current markets of Europe, the Middle East and Asia. As our new owner is Malaysian we have already gained a considerable presence across the region, with exciting possibilities to take this even further in the coming months and years. As a company we’re fighting fit, and have learnt an awful lot about being upbeat and concentrating on meeting our customers’ demanding expectations.” n