United Varnish & Print Finishing (PTY) Ltd was founded on the 1st March 1995 when Leon Kaimowitz, Paul Hastilow, Aiden O'Meara and Reinhardt Pieper bought the assets of Berndt Schuttler Print Finishing (PTY) Ltd and merged it with Ultra Varnishing Services (PTY) Ltd to form the new company. The name United Varnish & Print Finishing (PTY) Ltd was conceived by Paul Hastilow as we were uniting two companies that are in print finishing.
The business grew steadily and by November of 1999 the company re-located to new premises of 1200mē in N'dabeni . By February 2000 the company had grown to a turnover that has tripled and the operations started showing a small net profit. During February 2000 Werner Weber, a charted accountant by profession, bought the shares of Aiden O'Meara and was asked to join the UVP team permanently. During October of the same year, the shares of Reinhardt Pieper was acquired by the partners.
During the year 2001, UVP bought the assets of Rudi Zender and started the company UVP Die-Forming (Pty) Ltd. This venture was to secure UVP of a reliable supplier of cutting dies and other tooling and was also our first BEE transaction seeing 20% of the shares being held by our BEE partners. By May 2001 a holding company, UVP Holdings (Pty) Ltd was put in place to form the umbrella company for the group. This allowed us to start investing in other entities in a structured manner. Over the following 6 years UVP Properties (Pty) Ltd, UVP Properties EC (Pty) Ltd, United Process Engraving (Pty) Ltd, United Cloth Products (Pty) Ltd, UVP Print Finishing Gauteng (Pty) Ltd, UVP Tech Industries (Pty) Ltd and Springwater Fisheries (Pty) Ltd were formed and all operated fairly successfully.
During this time, shares were acquired in The Finishing Post (Pty) Ltd, UVP Pro Finishing (Pty) Ltd, UVP Pro Bind (Pty) Ltd and Scarab Jewellery Studio (Pty) Ltd.
During the 2007 and 2008 financial years, the group decided to refocus their time, energy and money on more profitable investments in the printing industry and property. During these years Stephan Weber, a charted accountant, joined UVP Holdings (Pty) Ltd as non-executive chairman. To streamline the various tooling companies, we merged the operations of United Process Engraving (Pty) Ltd and UVP Die-Forming (Pty) Ltd into one company UVP Products (Pty) Ltd. We sold United Cloth Products (Pty) Ltd and Scarab Jewellery Studio (Pty) Ltd. We also sold the non-performing UVP Pro Finishing (Pty) Ltd and closed down the operations of UVP Tech Industries (Pty) Ltd and Springwater Fisheries (Pty) Ltd.
In that financial year we not only increased our shareholding in The Finishing Post (Pty) Ltd to 68% with our BEE partners holding the balance of the shares, but also moved United Varnish & Print Finishing (Pty) Ltd to a new custom built factory that is also the group's head office consisting of 5000m2 of factory and office space. This move heralds a new era where all the operations are housed in owned factories.
It is important for us to expand our service offering to our existing clients and to find new opportunities in the printing, logistical and property industries this is a difficult task as we need to balance growth, the need for capital equipment and new oppertunities.
We recently bought Contour Bed and Lounge Manufacturing CC as well as the building of 6 500 m2 this is our first entry into the household goods market and we see it as an important step into the diversification of the group.
Significant investments in new equipment was done and specifically an order was placed for a new paper board sheeter from Marquip Ward United and should be commissioned early 2012.
In Johannesburg we acquired the management of Die Cut CC and invested significantly in a new plant and machinery to bolster our capacity and product offering. To the end of the year we acquired Evans Promotions CC and merged their operations with our operations in Johannesburg.
The last three months saw the acquisition of Label Engineering and Precision Dies CC by UVP Products and now effectively giving them a presence in Johannesburg.
With a group strongly rooted in South Africa and committed to adapt to the changing
face of business to more fairly reflect the true demographics of the country and the region as a whole.
The past year, was recently assessed by Iquad. On completion of this process we were issued
a new BBBEE certificate. The certificate is available for download as a pdf below.
BBBEE Certificate - download
UVP Holdings, 30 Cochrane Avenue, Epping 1, Cape Town, 8000, South Africa
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