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21 December 2015

Engineering Group announces 80 new jobs

The Hutchinson Group, with sites in Kilrea and Antrim, has announced that they are creating 80 jobs across the Group as part of a £4.1 million investment supported by Invest Northern Ireland.

Earlier this year the Hutchinson Group publicisied a £3.2m investment which included the expansion of their Kilrea site to 60,000 sq ft and further investment in laser technology with the addition of two new lasers. This announcement sees the creation of 80 jobs and an offer of support of £500,000 by Invest NI.

Hutchinson Group’s managing director, Mark Hutchinson said: “We are delighted to be able to announce the addition of 80 jobs to the Hutchinson Group. The roles consist of a mix of advanced manufacturing roles, business development and sales and marketing across the Group and I’m also pleased to say 40 of these roles have already been filled due to the Group’s expansion in the last nine months.”

Commenting on the news, Enterprise, Trade and Investment Minister, Jonathan Bell MLA, who also had a tour of the manufacturing site, said: “Hutchinson is an ambitious and long established family business which has experienced steady growth in recent years. This latest investment in leading edge technology will significantly enhance the firm’s engineering capabilities and enable it to secure new business in its target markets.

“The engineering sector accounts for a large proportion of manufactured exports from Northern Ireland. Hutchinson’s investment sends a clear signal to the advanced engineering sector across Great Britain and internationally that Northern Ireland has the skills and expertise to be a market leader.

“The 80 new jobs, to be recruited over the next three years, will generate £1.85million annually in additional salaries and create valuable manufacturing employment opportunities = in the Causeway Coast and Glens and surrounding council areas.

“Invest Northern Ireland has worked closely with Hutchinson over many years and its support is ensuring that the business has the necessary management team, structure, systems and skills in place to achieve its growth potential.”

Formed in 1971, Hutchinson Engineering is a leading sub contract laser and metal fabrication firm with a sister specialist aerospace arm, AeroTech, based in Antrim and a design company, H360, co-located with Hutchinson Engineering in Kilrea. The Group manufactures components for a number of sectors including transport, material handling, oil and gas, medical, agricultural and aerospace.

Mark Hutchinson concluded, “Our objective is to double business revenue over the next three years. We aim to achieve this by growing our customer base and differentiating ourselves in competitive global markets by providing value added products and services. Investing in state of the art technology, additional skilled staff and further expanding our manufacturing capabilities at Kilrea will help us to achieve this goal.

“Our longstanding relationship with Invest NI has been hugely beneficial and its continued support will help us to underpin our competitive position across the high value automotive, aerospace and materials handling sectors.”

Image: Trade and Investment Minister, Johnathan Bell with Mark Hutchinson


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