Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, March 24, 1992 TAG: 9203240189
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: PAUL DELLINGER NEW RIVER VALLEY BUREAU
DATELINE: PULASKI LENGTH: Medium
Employment has already increased as Magnox gears up for the planned expansion. "We began scaling up for this about a year ago," said Hiawatha Nicely Jr., vice president for operations and administration. "We will be adding to our employment as this project demands, the numbers of which haven't been defined."
Magnox started here in 1986 with 106 employees and is now up to 175.
"We expect to continue to grow at a moderate rate," Nicely said.
The expansion was approved in December, but had been in the planning stages long before that. Its timetable calls for the 15,000-square-foot addition at the 40-acre plant site just off Commerce Street to be complete by June 1993.
"Eighteen months from inception is our plan and our goal," Nicely said.
"We have brought this proposal to a reality through about the last three years of our research and development activities, all of which was done here in Pulaski."
He said the bulk of the capital spending will be for the specialized equipment needed to expand the operation.
The new highly automated equipment will produce sophisticated magnetic oxides in very fine particle sizes. The oxides will be used in the manufacture of increasingly advanced audio and video tapes and computer tapes and disks into the next century.
The products will go mainly into the high-grade audio and video industry, areas already served by Magnox, along with the computer digital field.
A pilot project tested the process to be used in the expansion. Then Magnox President F.H. Pollard, Nicely and Marketing Vice President Don Winquist presented the idea to the board of Mitsui Kinzoku, the major Magnox shareholder, in Japan last December.
Magnox has been associated with Mitsui Kinzoku since 1989. Approval came shortly afterward, and Magnox is now in the detailed engineering and design phase.
"This is another project that Magnox has implemented in Pulaski that has allowed us to be a major player in the world market," Nicely said. Magnox exports 65 percent of its product to Asia and Europe.
The Pulaski County Industrial Development Authority has issued industrial revenue bonds to help fund the project.
In research for the expansion and in other areas, he said, Magnox has relied heavily on Virginia Tech and its chemical and engineering departments as well as New River Community College and its affiliation with the Virginia Center for Innovative Technology.
These assets, he said, along with Magnox's own research staff of about 25 people, have allowed it to become a highly efficient producer of recording media materials.
"The project itself will be engineered internally by Magnox, by our projects and facilities design engineers, and the facilities and equipment installation will be done by contract," he said.
"We will take our existing product precursor and modify it through this new facility, giving us the capability for much higher-performance magnetic iron oxide," he said. "It's going to be very high-tech."
The marketing and development effort is what drives the Magnox research team, under Areillo Corradi, vice president for technology, Nicely said. The researchers seek new products for Magnox's customer base, and the market people seek ways of expanding that base.
Magnox is also known to put more of its profits back into research and development than many companies, which is a key to its continued growth.
by CNB