A 138-YEAR-OLD Forfar firm hailed as a beacon for Scottish manufacturing was at the centre of celebrations yesterday.

The spotlight was shone on David Ritchie (Implements) Ltd at an event to mark the opening of a job-creating £600,000 factory extension at Suttieside.

Scottish Engineering chief executive Peter Hughes praised the firm, for its vision and commitment to the area through the development.

Ritchie, which specialises in supplying handling, storage and security equipment for the offshore, industrial gas and chemical, defence, glass, distribution, automotive, rail and utility sectors, now has all of its operations on one site thanks to the extension.

It closed its Whitehills operation and sold it to provide part of the finance for the new plant, aimed at providing greater manufacturing capacity. Mr Hughes said Ritchie’s success came against a difficult background for the manufacturing industry.

“The company employs many highly skilled people and, with the dramatic increase in technology change in recent years, the company has moved with the times to tackle new and challenging markets,” he said.

Mr Hughes described Ritchie as a significant employer not only in Angus, but Tayside, with a growing output of offshore containers and baskets for the oil and gas industries.

Ritchie managing director Tony Walker unveiled a development in the renewable energy field. He showed off two prototype wind turbines, one of which is feeding power into the factory.

Mr Walker said that including Ritchie’s joint-venture galvanizing plant, which brought more than £11 million into Angus last year, almost 150 people were employed on the site.

Sales and marketing director John MacAskill said Ritchie is making headway against low-wage economies, supplying industrial gas and offshore equipment to south-east Asia and west Africa.

The factory investment, he said, underlined Ritchie’s commitment to Forfar, Angus and Scotland as a sustainable manufacturing base.

But he added, “However, we do call on the Scottish and UK governments to ensure that Scotland and the UK remains an attractive place to invest and do business in.”

Yesterday saw the ceremonial burial of a time capsule, among the last items to be fabricated at its old plant, containing relics from Ritchie’s history as well as other artefacts.