COVER STORY
A leap forward
On 25th October Bossard Group announced the purchase of the
fastening division of KVT Koenig Group in a CHF200 million deal expected to close towards the end of November. A couple of weeks later Phil Matten caught up with Bossard Group CEO, David Dean, to hear his thoughts on a strategic leap forward.
The inevitable opening question is “Why KVT?” “We have been looking at KVT for probably 15 years,” David
Dean responds. “The last twice it was too expensive. This time it is still not cheap but reasonable. We are in a different market environment now and I think the equity investors wanted to divest to an industrial buyer rather than another equity group. The acquisition gives us a good complementary business in
a field that is very interesting to us. We want to do more with blind fasteners and branded products - as we have started to do in Asia. Some of those are brands that KVT already represents here in Europe. KVT takes the solution approach for technical applications,
just as Bossard does. It has a good foothold in Germany, as well as in Austria, Switzerland and some eastern European countries, giving us additional presence in those markets. In all KVT has some 13,000 customers to which we can now present some of Bossard’s services. The difference is that KVT has concentrated on those products
it carries. These are definitely not products you just sell on the street; they are ‘design in’ products, which means a lot of technical and advisory support. Again, this is also a Bossard strength. What KVT has not been able to offer is a comparable logistics programme in order to be a full VMI single source supplier. Bossard has the full range plus a comprehensive logistics service - in addition to the engineering capabilities that both companies possess. As a result we will now be able to cover a much broader field of applications.”
KVT Koenig also includes a specialist manufacturing
operation. Is that included in the deal? “No, we have acquired the fastener distribution part. The Koenig Expander® manufacturing business is retained by the
financial investors. However, we will distribute the Expander programme into general industry while they continue to focus on automotive and hydraulic customers. General industry demand tends to be 100,000 - 200,000 pieces maximum as opposed to the millions supplied to automotive. Koenig Expander will supply the large volume OEMs direct from manufacturing and use us for the wider industrial market where they do not have the distribution platform.”
38 Fastener + Fixing Magazine • Issue 78 November 2012
Will the KVT brand be integrated to Bossard? “We intend to retain what is an established and distinctive
brand. KVT has strong market recognition for what they do and they are good at it – there is no point in destroying those strengths. Obviously we want to capitalise on their network of customers and see what additional Bossard services we can introduce to enhance what KVT already offers. The focus of this acquisition is not to take out costs and
achieve synergies at the back end. It is far more about the market end - how we can develop to the benefit of both companies and also how we can expand the business of KVT through other parts of the Bossard global business.”
So the new warehouse expansion in Zug is not
intended for KVT? “The warehouse is finished and ready to cope with more volume
but we are not going to combine the KVT business into Zug – they already have their own logistics facilities. We didn’t build the new warehouse for an acquisition: we built it because we wanted additional capacity to continue to grow our existing business. The economy is not currently in a booming phase but that is OK
– it will come back and our additional logistics capacity is crucial in being able to respond to opportunities for further growth.”
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96 |
Page 97 |
Page 98 |
Page 99 |
Page 100 |
Page 101 |
Page 102 |
Page 103 |
Page 104 |
Page 105 |
Page 106 |
Page 107 |
Page 108 |
Page 109 |
Page 110 |
Page 111 |
Page 112 |
Page 113 |
Page 114 |
Page 115 |
Page 116 |
Page 117 |
Page 118 |
Page 119 |
Page 120 |
Page 121 |
Page 122 |
Page 123 |
Page 124 |
Page 125 |
Page 126 |
Page 127 |
Page 128 |
Page 129 |
Page 130 |
Page 131 |
Page 132 |
Page 133 |
Page 134 |
Page 135 |
Page 136 |
Page 137 |
Page 138 |
Page 139 |
Page 140 |
Page 141 |
Page 142 |
Page 143 |
Page 144 |
Page 145 |
Page 146 |
Page 147 |
Page 148 |
Page 149 |
Page 150 |
Page 151 |
Page 152 |
Page 153 |
Page 154 |
Page 155 |
Page 156