At Hoover Precision Products East Granby our scope including expanding the sales of silicon nitride balls for Hoover and our Japanese parent company.
We identified a competitor in Europe who manufactured complete ceramic balls from powder though forming, sintering and then ball lapping. The company was the smallest of the global producers of this product and they had very limited ball- lapping and measurement capabilities. They had impressive sales coverage in Europe and sold small quantities to all of the bearing producers in Europe.
They asked us to produce balls using their blanks for them in the United States to help them get more production at a lower costs.
Our counter offer was as follows:
- We would purchase their ball manufacturing equipment and move it to the US.
- We would purchase their ball inventory.
- We would purchase their customer list.
- We would hire their sales person as an employee.
- They would exit the blank production process.
This was agreed.
A cash transaction occurred and we hired their salesperson to help us expand the sales effort in Europe.
This project was very successful. There was a nice influx of new work that was so significant that it was largely produced and managed by our Japanese parent company.