The Telford-based web offset and sheetfed printer was acquired by investment company Hypax seven months ago.
PCP managing director Nick Evans said the Hypax team had been “fantastic” since buying the company from Claverley Group in May.
“They’ve worked with us to fully understand the business, and where they can invest and make a difference,” he explained.
He said Hypax had ambitions to build upon the PCP acquisition by creating a group of printing companies, and the investor had looked at about 20 possible buys so far with some potential deals still on the table.
“They see us as an evergreen investment,” he added.
As part of the fresh investment plans PCP has ordered its first cobot – a Komori/MBO CoBo-Stack model for delivery in the new year. It will operate on the end of a stitching line, palletising jobs.
“We’ve also ordered a second Palamides stacker. We’ve had an upturn in demand for double-parallel, A5 work, probably due to postage costs,” Evans added.
The Palamides will be supplied by Friedheim International in Q1.
Alongside the circa-£500,000 investment, PCP is also planning to add voltage optimisation tech, which will lower the voltage to certain items of equipment and reduce the firm’s emissions. Details are currently being finalised.
Evans said that as part of the efficiency drive PCP had announced plans to rebalance capacity and become more flexible through a change of shift patterns.
The business currently runs 24/6 and is now consulting with the workforce on plans to change that to 24/5 – but with the flexibility to run 24/6 or 24/7 at peak times.
Around 20 jobs are likely to go at the 200-employee firm as a result, although Evans said that discussions were ongoing “and if we can reduce that, we will”.
The workforce has been briefed on the plans over the past week.
PCP had sales of £31.5m last year. Evans said the trading in December was slightly above budget, and he expected the business to be EBITDA-positive by the end of the year.
It prints for a wide range of customers including publishers, brands and holiday companies. Its product range includes magazines, brochures and catalogues along with in-house mailing and fulfilment. It also offers large-format digital printing.
