Bottero recently celebrated its 60th anniversary with with a ‘Family Day’ dedicated to its employees, partners and their families
Cuneo-based Bottero, established in 1957, celebrated its 60th anniversary with a special Family Day, and aims to exceed EUR 200 million in sales by 2020.
It was 1957 when Pasquale Bottero left his job at a glass manufacturer’s shop in Vernante (Piedmont) to launch Bottero Costruzioni Meccaniche jointly with Antonino Faccenda, and to introduce the earliest innovations in flat glass processing machines. Sixty years later, Bottero spa of Cuneo celebrates its leadership position in the world of glass. And it did so in style on Saturday, 21 October with a ‘Family Day’ dedicated to its employees, partners and their families, attended by more than 1,000 guests.
The Cuneo-based company exports 95% of its product overseas, owns four manufacturing plants around the world and, thanks to its ability to land ongoing work orders in the industries in which it operates, has set its sights, by 2020, on breaking the EUR 200 million ceiling in annual sales. At this time, there are more than 50,000 Bottero machines installed around the world, on every continent. Reliable products, the result of ongoing investments in research and development, they continue to meet customers’ needs.
“These first 60 years of business activity have made Bottero the only company in the world to provide a complete range of solutions for all the flat and hollow glass processing sectors, manufacturing products for small- and medium-sized businesses as well as production lines for large international industrial groups,” remarks Aldo Faccenda, director of Human Resources for Bottero spa. “With 60 years of experience, our multinational plays a lead role in the production of glass processing machines and systems, providing reliable, innovative, technological products while also paying the utmost attention to the needs of our customers. These are qualities that continue to allow the company to win new, key contracts for the manufacture of sophisticated lines for groups that are global leaders in glass manufacturing and to outdo contenders from Germany and Japan, countries that are traditional competitors with Italy in the production of machine tools for the glass industry. Perhaps not many people are aware of it, but the glass for smartphones, tablets and iPads, a part of the typical mobile devices we all have, is made with Bottero machines. Which is sort of like saying that every Italian (and many others, too) probably has electronic devices in their pockets with ‘made by Bottero’ components.”
“An example is that we recently acquired three new orders for laminated glass systems: two lines for US Guardian Group for its plants in Hungary and Thailand, and one for Saint Gobain, for a German facility that is part of the French industrial group. Overall value of the three orders: more than EUR 10 million.”
“The contract in Germany, with Saint Gobain, is the third awarded to Bottero this year by the French Group, on the heels of two float lines, one in India and one in Poland,” explains Marco Giraudo, sales manager for the Bottero spa Engineering division. “It is an extremely innovative line that manufactures over-sized glass sheets (6 x 3.21 meters) every 45 seconds, with output glass thicknesses that range from 4 to 30 millimetres. Another unique feature,” continues Giraudo, “is that the plant’s operations are all automated: the line operator’s only job is to oversee the process”.
Delivery of the line is scheduled for February 2018.
“The partnership between Bottero and the Guardian Group is longstanding. At the plant in Thailand, there is already a ‘made by Bottero’ float line, to which we will be adding another new plant for laminated glass. The Group has also decided to invest in Hungary, contracting with Bottero for a very high-tech line – increasingly in demand in the Industry 4.0 era. The two lines have features similar to those for the line produced for Saint Gobain, and their delivery is scheduled for the first few months of 2018,”
“Bottero has set out on a course of action with a specific growth objective in mind – concludes a company spokesperson -: to reach 200 million euros in sales by the end of the decade. To be able to meet our goal, we will need to maximize the combined skills of our divisions that are the pillars of Bottero’s success; that is, the standard and special machines for flat glass and the solutions for hollow glass.”