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INOXPA receives the Prince Felipe Award for Business Competitiveness

Candi Granés, General Manager of INOXPA, receiving the award from her Royal Highness the Princess of Asturias

On Wednesday February 3rd, INOXPA collected the Prince Felipe Award for Business Competitiveness in the Small and Medium Business category from Her Royal Highness the Princess of Asturias and the Minister of Industry, Tourism and Trade Miguel Sebastián. This award recognises the work undertaken by INOXPA over the past few years, especially its efforts to internationalise despite the highly unfavourable economic climate within Spain. This award, one of the most important in the country, strengthens INOXPA’s position as one of the leading companies in the region of Girona.

The Prince Felipe Award

The Prince Felipe Awards for Business Excellence, awarded by the Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Trade, were established in 1993 as a means of recognizing the achievements of Spanish companies in various categories, specifically Internationalisation, Tourism Excellence, Information Society, Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energies, and also Industrial Quality and Innovation. There are also three special awards: Business Competitiveness Award for a Small and Medium Business and Business Competitiveness Award for a Big Business, and an Individual Award for Business Achievements. In the 2009 edition, the jury awarded the first of these special awards, in the Small and Medium Business category, to INOXPA, Iberdrola received the award in the Big Business Category and the president of Mercadona, Juan Roig Alfonso, received the individual award for Business Achievement. Since the awards were first established, three other Small and Medium Businesses from Catalonia, namely Oken (Rubí, in 1999), Natura Bissé (Barcelona, in 2004) and Metalquimia (Girona, 2006/2007), have also been honoured. Freixenet, in 2004, and Simon, in 2003, received the award in the Big Business category.

Other awards

In 2007, the Winebrane© system developed by INOXPA was nominated for the Innovation Award at the Intervitis Interfructa© trade fair in Stuttgart (Germany). Winebrane© is designed to optimise and regulate the concentration of dissolved gases in wine. It is most commonly used to reduce the CO² and O² concentration, for carbonation and to maintain and regulate the CO² concentration in a wide range of wines. In 2008, this system was nominated for the Most Innovative Design award of the Institute of Industrial Technical Engineers, Barcelona.

IN BRIEF

A presence in five continents

INOXPA is distinguished by the effort expended on internationalising the company. It has sales offices in 16 countries and a network of more than 100 distribution points spread over five continents, with headquarters located on a 15,000 square metre site in the heart of Pla de l’Estany, in Banyoles, Spain. The group’s growth has been centred on Europe, mainly the Mediterranean region, where it is currently the leadingsupplier of pumps and components in its market sector. One of the growth axes for the company’s strategy involves investing in developing countries whose growth is stronger than in Europe. INOXPA has identified three such regions for direct investment: Eastern Europe, Asia and North Africa. As a result of this expansion policy, we opened an office in Russia in 2006, expanded our South African office in 2007, and opened other offices in Algeria and Australia in 2008 and 2009, respectively. As for the implementation of manufacturing sites, we have inaugurated four such sites in the past four years in France (2006), Portugal (2008), China (2009) and India (2009). The promotion of creativity and investment in research, development and innovation, to which we dedicate 4.7% of our annual budget, are further key aspects ofINOXPA’s strategic plan.

Background

Candi Granés, general manager of INOXPA,founded the company in Banyoles (Girona, Spain) in 1972 from the company Bombas Félez, a water pump manufacturer. INOXPA began by specialising in the manufacture of stainless steel pumps for the food sector, which at the time was a completely new product concept.

In 1976, the company incorporated new product lines and launched three new companies, namely Candigra, Wine Pumps and Candipharm, which together formed a large group specialised in process and service management in four main industrial sectors: food, wine, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals.In 1980, the company began its international expansion by establishing a subsidiary in Perpignan, France. Indeed, exports currently account for around 65% of the Group’s consolidated sales.