Leamington engineering firm embarking on ambitious growth strategy

A rapidly growing Leamington-based engineering and manufacturing business has been supported by Coventry and Warwickshire Growth Hub on its journey.

Tecman Speciality Materials employs 35 and makes components using adhesive tape in the automotive, medical, and offshore and onshore industries. Notably, it has developed anti-thermal propagation technology for electric vehicle (EV) battery packs, which prevent or delay heat transfer between adjacent battery cells.

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As well as aiming to double its turnover in the next 12 months, it is creating three separate divisions.

Tecman Innovation will focus on research and design; Tecman Manufacturing will be responsible for delivering exceptional quality, reliability, and consistency across all products and production processes.

And Tecman Automation will be dedicated to Industry 4.0 - developing world-leading manufacturing systems designed for highly automated, cost-effective production.

"We are on a rapid growth trajectory with a large portion of our business growth coming from sectors identified by the government as critical to the national industrial strategy, such as the renewable energy sector, which includes wind blade protection and EV batteries," said operations director David Roberts, who contacted Coventry and Warwickshire Growth Hub account manager, Laura Delahunty, to discuss support to upskill its staff.

She put him in touch with Warwick District Council, Warwickshire County Council and the University of Warwick Science Park’s Business Ready programme for various support.

"We are also well known within the healthcare and life sciences sectors as a result of our work in diagnostics manufacturing and for producing hundreds of thousands of face shields each year following Covid, for health providers in UK, Norway, Italy, France, Germany and the Netherlands," added Roberts.

"The EV work in particular is really accelerating, and we have secured a significant contract with an OEM in the area which meant we wanted to upskill staff in various areas of the business to help to future-proof our business and meet the demands of the new work that is coming in.

"As part of our strategic workforce development, we initiated our first production apprenticeship with funding support from Warwickshire Skills Hub, enabling the recruitment of machine technician Louie Fitchett.

"This invaluable support has facilitated the expansion of our apprenticeship programme, and we are now exploring opportunities to introduce apprenticeships across other areas of the business to align with our ongoing organisational evolution."

Roberts added that the business, though still relatively small, wanted to move from its 23,000 sq ft premises to a 50,000 sq ft facility and that the county council was helping to identify a "suitable location".

Laura Delahunty noted: "This is a great example of partnership working in the sub-region because Tecman is on track to scale rapidly, and we have found at the Growth Hub that scaleup businesses require different types of support to other SMEs.

"Tecman is working towards becoming a Tier 1 supplier to OEMs in the UK and internationally with their EV product, and they have found our support to be incredibly useful."

Steven Convery, business skills support officer at Warwickshire Skills Hub, added: "The Auto, Future Mobility, and Energy sectors are major employers and drivers of economic activity in the county, and are playing a key role in the UK's green transition.

"Tecman Speciality Materials is a prominent player in this sector, and we have been delighted to support their workforce development initiatives.

"In addition to general skills training, we have facilitated connections to relevant support programmes and strategic partners."