Engineering firm wins big U.S. contract

Press, 31 January 1984, Page 9

Engineering firm wins big U.S. contract

PA Dunedin A Dunedin engineering firm has won a multimillion dollar order from the United States, which indirectly will provide several more jobs in Christchurch. J. and A. P. Scott Engineering, Ltd, has received an order for the complete design and manufacture of an automated plant which will produce refrigerators.

For competitive reasons the name of the United States-based company has not been disclosed. Because of the size of the project the work will be shared with an associated company J. and A. P. Scott Penfold of Christchurch.

Other work will be subcontracted in Otago and Canterbury. Mr Graham Batts, general manager of Scotts, says the job will require extra designers, engineering trades people and apprentices to meet the 18-month deadline. “The order is significant because it is the first time this large American company has gone offshore for equipment,” he said yesterday. The general manager of J. and A. P. Scott Penfold, Mr A. P. Whitehead, said last evening that the contract would mean jobs for four or five engineering trades people with the company.

Mr Whitehead said the company had lost several workers recently through attrition and that the new workers would be taken on in March or April, or whenever the plans for the new contract came off the drawing board. Although the company was expecting to be busy for about 18 months with the contract he said the new positions would be permanent. Part of the success of the Christchurch company, which recently won one of three Trade amd Industry export awards, lay in its concentration on the export market, rather than relying on the local market, Mr Whitehead said.