AYMA herramientas - closeness creates trust

AYMA Herramientas is a long-standing partner and one of the largest commercial agencies to work together with MAPAL in Europe. The family business employs around 80 people and has established a trading network throughout Spain. In addition to its headquarters in Ezkio-Itsaso, AYMA has offices in Vitoria (Álava), Gijón (Asturias) and La Llagosa (Barcelona). The company also has branch offices in Madrid, Bollullos de la Mitacion (Seville), Valencia (Valencia) and Bilbao (Vizcaya). Jesús García Uralde, the father of the current managing director Jesús M. García Lanciego, founded the commercial agency in 1959 together with other partners.

Ezkio-Itsaso is located in the Basque Country. The small region on the Atlantic coast was once the centre of the Spanish steel and shipyard industry. AYMA’s business was initially based on the sale of special steels for machine engineering. Precision tools were added in the 1980s – today the company concentrates entirely on this market and offers customers a comprehensive range and individual process solutions.
 

Unsere Zusammenarbeit begann in 1970er-Jahren. Mein Vater nahm damals mit MAPAL Kontakt auf und sprach mit dem damaligen geschäftsführenden Gesellschafter, Dr. Georg Kress, über die Möglichkeiten einer Handelsvertretung. Mit dem Vertrieb von Präzisionswerkzeugen wollte er ein zweites Standbein für AYMA schaffen. Da mein Vater ohnehin bei den Kunden vor Ort war, wollte er ihnen ein vielseitigeres Produktsortiment vorstellen. Im Prinzip war es ein logischer Schritt, denn die Abnehmer der Spezialstähle waren potenzielle Kunden für Präzisionswerkzeuge, mit denen sie den Stahl bearbeiten konnten. 

AYMA ging also mit den ersten Werkzeugen von MAPAL in den Markt. Zunächst waren das Reibahlen, Fräswerkzeuge und Werkzeuge mit Führungsleisten, mit denen wir schnell erfolgreich waren. MAPAL baute das Produkt- und Serviceprogramm in den Folgejahren aus und wir expandierten im gleichen Umfang. Heute ist AYMA mit acht Standorten in ganz Spanien präsent und wir sind in der Lage, schnell und flexibel auf die Bedürfnisse unserer Kunden zu reagieren. Unsere Kunden kommen in erster Linie aus dem Maschinenbau und der Automobilindustrie. Aber wir sind auch im Luftfahrtbereich aktiv, bei den Zulieferern und vielen kleinen Unternehmen, die die unterschiedlichsten Produkte herstellen. 

Das Stahlgeschäft wurde in den 1980er-Jahren schwieriger. Wir beschlossen damals, uns ganz auf den Handel mit Präzisionswerkzeugen zu fokussieren. Wir wussten, wir sind mit MAPAL Werkzeugen gut aufgestellt und haben das notwendige Know-how.

Unsere Kunden können sich darauf verlassen, dass wir für jede Anwendung die beste Bearbeitungslösung entwickeln. Unsere enge Zusammenarbeit mit den Spezialisten von MAPAL hat sich da stets bewährt. Wie unterstützen die Anwender beim Auslegen und Einfahren neuer Werkzeuge bis hin zur Optimierung der Maschinenabläufe. Wir sind quasi bei allen Prozessschritten für sie da. Wir kümmern uns um die nachgelagerten Prozesse und bieten den Kunden einen umfassenden After-Sales-Service. An allen Standorten von AYMA halten wir ein Sortiment an gängigen Standardwerkzeugen vor, wir haben verschiedene Tool Management Systeme im Programm und richten bei Bedarf ein Konsignationslager für den Kunden ein. Reparaturen oder die Wiederaufbereitung von Werkzeugen führen wir ebenfalls aus.

Both MAPAL and AYMA are family businesses. Both companies stand for continuity in terms of the staff and this creates a lot of trust among customers. As well as this, we maintain a similar corporate culture. We focus heavily on quality, service and innovation. We claim to be at the cutting edge of technology. AYMA benefits from the fact that MAPAL has been consistently expanding its product and service range for decades and is providing strong impetus with new tool developments. This has greatly enhanced our market position in Spain. We have to keep in mind the dynamics with which the automotive industry has developed here in this country. And MAPAL knows the requirements of this sector very well. This is also evident in the field of electric mobility. We see good opportunities there and already have some customers that we are supplying with the appropriate tools from MAPAL.

Yes, my brother Luis Garcia (55) also works in the company. He joined AYMA in 1988 and has been with us a little longer than me. Luis has worked in various fields. He started in Sales, where he specialised in the large machine tool manufacturers. He now heads up our Madrid office and serves one of our largest customers.

Our employees are in daily contact with the MAPAL Customer Service team and communication runs smoothly and directly. We’re also in contact with the technicians and development engineers at MAPAL. This is important because larger projects usually involve a corresponding number of custom tools. With technical support from MAPAL, we can optimise the process as soon as the tools are commissioned. Errors do not occur in the first place. It is quite common with major customers that employees from other MAPAL sites are also involved in projects. We have personal contacts there too, which is of course a huge advantage for the customer. In this way, we avoid duplicating work in the design of processes. Everything runs quickly, easily and efficiently.

I can think of two projects with major automobile manufacturers. First, there was a project with FORD. When we first started working with FORD, we worked closely with the specialists at company headquarters and the MAPAL subsidiary in the UK. The work involved a new machining process. We were very well supported in the design and commissioning of the tools. Our concept was perfect and this has had an extremely positive effect on subsequent projects, both here in Spain and at FORD’s other factories abroad. The same applies to our projects with RENAULT. Here, we’ve been working very closely with the MAPAL team in France for many years and have enjoyed lasting success here as well. Projects like these have earned us great trust from our customers.

Anyone interested in finding out more can visit our website www.ayma.es and get an overview of our company and our range of services. Our catalogues are also available to download there. Our staff at the headquarters in Ezkio-Itsaso and at our branch offices will be happy to answer your queries. At the moment, the best way to reach them is by email or telephone. But we hope that in the post-coronavirus world, we’ll be able to focus more on face-to-face meetings again. And maybe we’ll even meet at a visit to a trade fair again. We regularly have a stand at BIEMH (International Machine-Tool Biennial Exhibition) in Bilbao and at Metal Madrid. 

Jesús M. García Lanciego (57) studied engineering and joined the commercial agency AYMA HERRAMIENTAS in 1989. He initially worked in the technical area to drive the 
development of the tool programme.