Engineers defy might of China
Paul Jessup‘s Lower Hutt firm Metco Engineering has always struggled to keep up with the powerhouse that is China’s manufacturing industry.
But it has remained strong, and responded by becoming one of the largest manufacturing companies in New Zealand.
‘‘China has been one of those thorns in our side,’’ Jessup said.
‘‘With their pricing, a lot of customers just jump ship into purchasing Chinese-made products and that’s still around.
‘‘We are competing China.’’
Jessup started Metco Engineering in 2002, with Brent Greer.
Back then it was a two-man band, but fast-forward 15 years and the company now employs 58 people, and has more than 300 clients in New Zealand and Australia.
‘‘There is no one else that has always with got a one-stop-shop like ours,’’ Jessup said.
‘‘No one else is doing that. They are in Germany and America, but not in New Zealand.’’
The company works on numerous projects across many different sectors including military, fire, police, aerospace, agriculture, construction and roading.
One of Metco’s biggest projects involved making gun safes for all New Zealand police vehicles. It also worked with KiwiRail when it lowered all the tracks in the tunnels between Plimmerton and Waikanae in 2010 and 2011.
‘‘We had a massive project of making all the reinforcing washers for that project,’’ Jessup said. ‘‘That was a huge job for us because we were pretty little back then.’’ At the moment, his team was building beehives.
Aside from the strong competition from China, other challenges included keeping up with technology and finding suitable staff.
Looking forward, Jessup wants to continue developing new ideas.
‘‘We are always looking at doing it better,’’ he said. ‘‘I think as soon as you become complacent, the competition will come and snap up that work, or put out a better product, so just constantly innovating.’’
He also hoped to continue growing the company.
‘‘We’ve just been focusing on getting our capacity right, but we are about to invest in some new gear out of Germany. There’s lots of potential there.’’
Jessup hoped the industry would invest more in education for the younger generations looking at careers in manufacturing.
‘‘Everyone has got this attitude that everything is made in China, well guess what? It ain’t. It’s far from it. And we need to change people’s mindsets with that.
‘‘If you look around you, around New Zealand, you’ll see what’s actually made here. You’ll be surprised.’’
Metco Engineering was the winner of the Supporting Gold category at the Wellington Gold Awards on July 7.