Word for word forward

One year on from the closure of Lola Composites, Mike Richardson meets Forward Composites’ managing director, Paul Jackson to hear how the company is busy making progress.

Something that caught my eye among the many pages of words written about the UK’s composites manufacturing industry in the last year concerns Forward Composites and the announcement of its formation as ‘a new force in composite solutions’.

The company was established following the closure of Lola Composites in 2012. After some time was spent searching for an outside buyer, managing director, Paul Jackson and technical director, Ed Collings - along with an investor decided to purchase the assets from the administrator.

Just over a year on and the company has grown, taking on major projects such as the Watchkeeper UAV and Hybrid Air Vehicle programmes, as well as major tooling projects for Bombardier and several Formula 1 teams - all of which has seen the company exceed its sales targets.

Far from sitting back on its laurels, the Huntingdon, Cambridgeshire-based company is developing new manufacturing techniques that it hopes will expand its capabilities and take it into new and exciting markets.

Jackson’s reputation in the composites industry has been built on over 25 years of experience; starting out as apprentice pattern maker and working his way up to commercial director, whilst his colleague, Collings’ CV includes design and analysis of composites structures in motorsport, aerospace and defence.

During the administration period Lola Composites was advertised as a business for sale. Potential buyers came and went until eventually, the administrators allowed Jackson to mind the business during the administration period. It was an experience that he says gave him the appetite and opportunity to run the business himself. Jackson partnered up with Collings, a senior engineer with whom he had worked together in the Lola days.

“We purchased all the assets of Lola Composites in administration – the core equipment we needed in order to function as an end to end composite manufacturing company,” Jackson begins. “We also purchased the ERP manufacturing and quality management systems, which was really important because the Watchkeeper UAV programme stipulated that we needed to obtain AS9100 Rev C within a certain number of weeks.

“We now have one year’s trading under our belt, but we have still got a lot of work to do, as we move into our second year. We built some important bridges with the suppliers immediately, whilst some of them already knew us. At the same time, we linked our engineering team to understand their full offering and looked at ways to reduce cost.

“Being careful and prudent, and managing the supply chain and the products we make for the customers is key. We want to be in at the front end by designing for manufacture rather than designing something that just cannot be made cost effectively. To differentiate ourselves from the competition, our philosophy is engineered excellence and engineering to a cost.”

Jackson is looking for longevity and stability for this company – having the right supply chain and building the right team of people is critical to this process.

“Training is very important, and we are talking to local colleges and schools, and we are looking at apprenticeship schemes too,” he states. “We have brought in some young people to try and ‘home grow’ our own. Through Huntingdonshire District Council, we have set up a cluster network for innovative composites companies with some of the other SMEs within the area to discuss the kinds of issues we have in the industry - and skills are one of them. Apprenticeships are coming back now and it is really important to look at training and try and generate engineering skills.”

Jackson adds that Forward Composites exceeded the sales forecast for year one, which was helped by winning the Watchkeeper UAV programme contract.

“This programme is for the manufacture of a set number of unmanned air vehicles,” he maintains. “We manufacture the entire airframe, and once complete it is shipped to the customer where the avionics are installed. We are one of only a few independent UK manufacturers of UAVs and we are very proud of this feat. We are looking closely at the UAV sector and what other opportunities there are available.”

A local newspaper named Jackson and the company ‘Business Person of the Year’ and ‘Business of the Year’ respectively, which for a company that has been trading for just over a year it is a huge achievement. It sounds like Jackson has memorised how he plans to take the company forward – word for word.

“Words like ‘respect’ and ‘trust’ are very important to me,” he concludes. “I have embraced the challenge to get to this point in our lives. Our people are important and we have worked hard to bring together the right team. This will continue as we grow. Regular communication meetings are essential to keep our staff up to date with progress and keep them focused on the job in hand. It is essential we all deliver to the strategy we have set.

www.forwardcomposites.com