The Engineering Technology Group (ETG), the supplier of a comprehensive range of machine tool solutions, has now formed a new business division for fabrication. Always intent on meeting the challenges of the marketplace, the new ETG division will provide turnkey solutions for the fabrication industry with the VLB Group UK Ltd as one of its partners.

The Fabrication Division will be headed up by Andrew Smith Hughes who joins ETG as new product manager for fabrication, with more than a decade of expertise in delivering turnkey solutions to the manufacturing industry. It will incorporate a range of technologies that include everything from tube bending, flatbed laser cutting and cold-roll forming to name a few - with ancillary fabrication product lines also available to support manufacturers.

The agreement between ETG and the VLB Group will provide a UK and Ireland sales and support network, bringing ‘state of the art’ tube and plate forming technology that will be comprehensively serviced by manufacturing experts. Mr Smith Hughes will spearhead the integration of the new division into the ETG business structure.

Mr Smith Hughes said: “For more than 10 years, I have worked as an engineer, account manager and at director level in the fabrication sector, specialising in building businesses in this potentially huge market with globally renowned brands. The ethos of ETG to deliver turnkey projects is a business model that has been overlooked in the fabrication market until now. This huge market gap provides a major opportunity for ETG to service the fabrication industry to levels never before seen – this makes the new ETG enterprise a remarkably exciting opportunity for the industry.”

As the first brand to be presented under the umbrella of the ETG Fabrication Division, the VLB Group are leaders in tube-bending and cold-roll forming. The VLB Group will be present at the Southern Manufacturing & Electronics Show this week (6-8 February) in Farnborough (Stand C170) as well as at MACH 2024 from the 15 to 19 April, taking place at the Birmingham NEC. Mr Smith Hughes will be at both events to present the new ETG business division and discuss the latest VLB Group product lines and solutions available to UK manufacturers.