Business News
Autobond – The Company
Wednesday 15. October 2008 - Autobond celebrated its 30th anniversary in February by announcing several groundbreaking product launches, including the worlds first laminator/encapsulator combination and the first laminator/UV roller coating machine.
Since its formation by George Gilmore, Autobond has not only bucked many industry trends but has set the standards to be met in the laminating sector.
The business has operated from its Heanor factory in Derbyshire since 1978, and today Autobond is probably the best known manufacturer of laminating equipment worldwide. In addition to designing, building and installing laminating machines, the company is a major importer and exporter of thermal and water-based film and a key producer of adhesives for use with laminators of any make.
“One of the main reasons for our success has been the high percentage of our revenue that we have always put into research and development,” says managing director John Gilmore, who runs the company with his brother Alan. “This has allowed us to continuously develop and try new ideas. Not everything on the drawing board ends up on the factory floor but were always looking to push the boundaries of laminating technology, while ensuring that quality remains at the core of everything we do.”
Autobond has remained a successful manufacturer for the graphic arts industry despite the fact that most other UK manufacturers for this sector have ceased trading. It has retained many traditional engineering skills within its workforce and continues as a family-run business, with the third Gilmore generation already working in the business in the UK and USA.
“In the early days I did a lot of selling and travelled a great deal of the world. However, apart from attending Graph Expo, IPEX and Drupa, I havent flown in quite a few years, which is good for the environment
and me! We have never employed sales personnel and what may surprise many people is that we win orders from quite a few companies who have seen nothing more than a video of the laminator in operation. Sometimes theyve seen Autobond machinery running years earlier at an exhibition, but not always.”
Placing an order on the strength of a video shows considerable faith and this is no doubt partly due to Autobonds long standing reputation. The very first laminator it sold – a hand-fed, water-based model – is still in operation.
“Because we supply the adhesive for use with the water-based laminators we have sold over the years, we have a very good idea of where they are and if they are still in use. More than 90 per cent of those early machines are in operation today. We would expect that if someone bought a laminator from us now, it would still be producing quality work effectively in 25 years time.”
Autobond bought the manufacturing rights for TH Dixon laminators in 1990, and acquired the assets of laminator manufacturer Lamtex when it went into receivership in 2006. However, it has been the technical breakthroughs that mark the companys highlights; one of the most significant being the launch in 1993 of laminators able to handle thermal film. This development marked the beginning of a shift away from more complex water-based laminating, which required greater operator skill, and made the process more appealing to sheet-fed printers. Until then, laminating had been the domain of finishing houses and specialist trade firms.
“We continued to automate functions on these thermal laminators, which made them easier to use and faster to make-ready, and this in turn helped to make laminating an attractive value-added process,” says John Gilmore. “Printers became interested in bringing the process in-house and laminating work to improve the appearance and durability of the printed product has made the process increasingly popular during the last ten years.”
A huge range of printed material is laminated: maps, book jackets, covers, brochures, presentation folders, cartons, labels, leaflets, catalogues, packaging etc. The introduction of easy to operate machines, plus ever tighter deadlines and shorter print runs has led to the process being brought in-house by sheet-fed printers around the world looking to handle as many processes as possible under one roof.
“Of course, the other big attraction was cost. A complete rethink of design during the late nineties meant that a B1 Autobond laminator, which would have cost £180,000 in 1998 could be purchased for £110,000 by 2001, with the latter being significantly more productive. The standardisation of parts has streamlined production and reduced the price even further, while the redesign that led to the launch of the Mini series resulted in laminators with an extremely small footprint – another important factor in their appeal to printers.”
Not everything is made at the Derbyshire factory. Like any manufacturer, over the years the company has sourced the best component parts suppliers it can. For example, the pistons used in the laminators come from SMC in Japan, Swiss firm Tool Temp makes the water heater that heats the relevant rollers, and the air clutches are made by Horton in the USA.
Autobond equips most of its models with Heidelberg Speedmaster feed heads from Germany, while UK manufacturer David Brown produces the motor gearbox combination. One of the benefits of the German electronics from Siemens, which are fitted to all of the laminators, is that they enable remote diagnostics facilities so Autobonds technicians can provide remote help to customers anywhere in the world.
One of the biggest trends in laminating has been the growth of the digital market, where printers want to improve the image quality and durability of the final printed product. This has traditionally presented certain difficulties. Stock coming out of most digital presses is low in moisture and high in static, making sheets difficult to separate and feed. In addition, some toners, particularly oil-based toners, are extremely difficult to get film to adhere to.
The ability of Autobonds laminators to heat the films adhesive to a high temperature and apply a substantial amount of pressure in the laminators nip rollers enables successful lamination of digitally printed work, which has made the Autobond models very popular in this rapidly expanding market.