Axon Automotive has recently moved from its start-up location in Wollaston to a significantly bigger 4180 sq. m (45,000 sq. ft) factory site on the Brackmills Industrial Estate, also in Northamptonshire. This relocation, funded by new parent company Bawtry Investments, is in response to a fourfold increase in business over the last two years.
Growth has been especially strong from export business orders, particularly from sales to an increasing number of non-EU based customers. This rapid growth has driven the need to move to larger premises in order to be able to expand Axon’s production facilities to meet both current and future market demand.
Axon Automotive
Chris Taylor, Managing Director of Axon Automotive, said: “Following the recapitalisation of Axon with backing from our new owners, we have been able to accelerate our expansion plans to meet our ever growing order book. The new Brackmills site has provided us with much needed factory space to expand capacity, enabling us to install a completely new in-line production facility, currently being built, which should be commissioned by the middle of this year.
“In addition to expanding production, the new site allows us to now substantially increase the Axon engineering projects team to make us even more responsive to customer needs and to permanently house a demonstration production line for customers to see our production technology first hand. The move has also provided enough space for a considerably bigger research and development area going forward. Overall, the current business plan has the Axon Automotive UK full time staff headcount projected to reach around 200 in the foreseeable future. We expect to continue to grow organically, particularly driven by securing new overseas OEM customers looking for lightweight vehicle production solutions.”
Axon Automotives’ carbon fibre-reinforced plastic (CFRP) Axontex composite beam making process technology is used worldwide to manufacture super-lightweight vehicle chassis and structural components. The CFRP based system is ideally suited for producing a vehicle frame which needs both rigidity and high impact crash resistance performance, enabling designs which can meet desired lightweight objectives and still provide extremely high levels of passenger safety cage performance.