Sally Thorley (pictured), who has been employed by Precision Products for nearly 30 years, has been appointed as the new managing director, taking over from Brian Owen www.precisionproducts.co.uk.

Located in Rustington, West Sussex, the company is one of the leading sub-contract manufacturers of precision-turned parts in the South of England.

Other senior appointments are Ian Jenkins moving across from production to become commercial manager and Jason Bullen joining the company as production manager.

The company recently became one of the first contract machinists in the UK to be accredited to AS9100 Rev D — the latest version of the quality management system standard for the aerospace and defence industries.

Precision Products is a long-established second-tier supplier to the aerospace sector, which accounts for around 20% of its turnover.

The end of 2017 marked 18 months since the company consolidated its business at Rustington and dispensed with a nearby satellite unit in Brighton.

In so doing, the sub-contractor went exclusively CNC, phasing out the use of cam-controlled multi-spindle turning machines and coil-fed lathes. Production is now carried out exclusively on 22 Citizen and Miyano CNC machines.

Mrs Thorley said: “By concentrating production in Rustington, we have more staff in one place, so we are able to work more flexibly.

“Our setters have become multi-skilled, allowing them to move freely between machines on the shopfloor, even from fixed- to sliding-head lathes, increasing production efficiency.

“It has streamlined our operation, reduced overheads and made us more competitive.

“As a result, we have been able to increase the number of long-term partner relationships we have with customers, leading to stable contracts that benefit both them and us.

“We now operate continuously from 5am on Monday to noon on Friday, and eliminating the previous gaps between day and night shifts has increased our machining capacity by 15%.

“With 32 employees — nearly the same number as we had before our rational-isation programme — we increased our turnover by 14% in 2017.”