Business View Oceania | January 2021

29 30 BUSINESS VIEW OCEANIA JANUARY 2021 BUSINESS VIEW OCEANIA JANUARY 2021 EASTCOAST FASTENERS PTY LTD Unit 38, 1 Cowpasture Place, Wetherill Park, NSW 2164 PO Box 6263 Wetherill Park, NSW 2164 T 02 9756 4844 F 02 9756 4848 E sales@eastcoastfasteners.com.au www.eastcoastfasteners.com.au www.eastcoastfasteners.com.au AUSTRALIA’S LARGEST SUPPLIER OF PROFAST FREE CALL 1800 236 801 SUPPLIERS OF PREMIUM QUALITY INDUSTRIAL FASTENERS Fasteners supplied by ECF feature in countless industrial applications across Australia. ECF is quickly becoming the fastener supplier of choice for customers in manufacturing, engineering, construction, building and mining, due to ECF’s extensive range, excellent quality control, fast delivery, competitive prices and sophisticated customer service. ECF is an independent, 100% Australian-owned business, with a proven track record in the fasteners industry and results far ahead of what other suppliers can achieve. SERVICE & EXPERT ADVICE Our experienced customer service personnel offer technical advice and on-site support and are dedicated to delivering an efficient experience, online or in person. SPANTEC SYSTEMS PTY LTD developed a beam that we thought was very clever. But we didn’t have a process to manufacture it.” It took a couple years to develop the process and build the machines, and in 1993/94 Spantec was ready to take off. Flooring seemed to be the ideal market for the beam, as there was very little available in steel floors at the time. There was a lot of hardwood in use, particularly in Australia, but it was getting more expensive and the quality was reducing. And while steel was very new on the market, the company decided it was a good time to start, although they did find that businesses were conservative and therefore slow to change. Over time, the business grew with an ever-present philosophy to automate the process as far as possible. “Maybe it’s my accounting background,” says Beaumont, “but I don’t like the manual processes. So we’ve really pushed automation. Unfortunately, because we’re the only people who specialise in floor frames, we’ve had to develop our own software and materials handling and processors – it makes it a bit harder and the end result is, we still spend close to four percent of our turnover on R & D and development of machinery and software.” Rather than having multiple locations, Spantec’s 38 employees are based on a single site in New South Wales, which creates a much more efficient manufacturing process. And freight is subsidised quite effectively, particularly into the other eastern states of Victoria and Queensland. Spantec’s individual products are cutting edge. A prime example is Boxspan – a stiff, box section beam that is particularly useful in ground floors. Stiffness is more important than strength in floors because people want to feel a floor that doesn’t have bounce. Spantec offers 13 different sizes (gauges) in that one product, for applications ranging from a small deck to a large commercial project. The beams range from a 100 depth up to a 250 depth. The company is currently developing a new open- web joist, which is much more important in upper floors, because of the need to run services through.