Coats acquires Gotex
- 05 Jun 2016
Coats, the world’s leading industrial thread manufacturer, has acquired Gotex, a Spanish based company which designs and manufactures high performance fibres, yarns and tapes used in the telecommunications, energy and oil and gas sectors. Coats has acquired 100% of Gotex which becomes part of Coats Speciality with immediate effect.
Gotex’s unique fibreglass coating technology and products will complement Coats’ existing coated aramid product range. There is much synergy between the product offerings and together, the companies will be able to provide an enhanced range of products to the fibre optics cable industry. The acquisition reinforces Coats’ strategy of expanding into value added engineered yarns.
Gotex is headquartered near Barcelona, Spain and has approximately 60 employees. It has three main categories of products:
· Technical yarns – yarns transformed via unique and proprietary coating technologies, used in the cable industry to reinforce, insulate and protect optical fibres.
· Technical woven tapes – woven high technical fibres, such as fibreglass, aramid or carbon used to protect cables from impacts, rodents, etc and in composites.
· Product trading – buying and selling additional products that cannot be manufactured in-house eg mica tapes, FRP rods, plastic films.
Its core customer base is fibre optic cable manufacturers, although oil and gas flexible pipe producers and high tech sports equipment manufacturers are also growing areas.
Paul Forman, Group Chief Executive, Coats, said: ‘Gotex is an exciting first acquisition for our Speciality business that is fully aligned with our growth strategy; a global market leader in developing and producing innovative, high performance materials that complement our exisiting product portfolio. It is an ideal fit with our Speciality business.’
David Ferré, Managing Director, Gotex, said: ‘This offers great opportunity both for Gotex and our customers. It provides a way to accelerate our business growth and further develop our brand through significantly enhanced market strength and opportunity, as well as prospects for product collaboration with a global market leader.’
The acquisition of Gotex follows the highly successful acquisition of GSD Corporate Ltd in May 2015 and also, more recently, Fast React Systems in May 2016. These three deals show Coats’ intent to grow via M&A in Speciality and Services, two areas of strategic priority.
ENDS
For more information and to request a photo of Anne Fahy contact:
Kristina Blissett, Head of Communications kristina.blissett@coats.com
T +44 (0)208 210 5084, M +44 (0)7714 539887
Notes to Editors
About Coats
Coats is the world’s leading industrial thread manufacturer and a major player in the Americas textile crafts market. At home in some 60 countries, Coats employs 19,000 people across six continents. Revenues in 2016 were US$1.5bn.
Coats’ pioneering history and innovative culture ensure the company leads the way around the world: providing complementary and value added products and services to the apparel and footwear industries; applying innovative techniques to develop high technology Performance Materials threads and yarns in areas such as automotive, composites and fibre optics; and extending the crafts offer into new markets and online.
Headquartered in the UK, Coats is a FTSE 250 listed company on the London Stock Exchange.
- Each year we make enough thread to go into 8 billion pairs of jeans - that’s one for every person on the planet
- Every month Coats produces enough thread to stretch all the way to the sun
- More than 450 million pairs of shoes are made every year using Coats’ thread
- More than 100 million car airbags are made using Coats’ Performance Materials thread every year
- In 1879 Thomas Edison used Coats’ thread in his experiments to invent the light bulb
- Our Red Heart knitting and crochet yarn brand has been named ‘America’s Most Recommended’ by the Women’s Choice Award for three years running
- Our flame retardant Performance Materials threads can withstand temperatures as high as 1,000 degrees Celsius
- Coats is the second largest supplier of zips to global brands