Renishaw plc is a British

engineering Engineering is the practice of using natural science, mathematics, and the engineering design process to Problem solving#Engineering, solve problems within technology, increase efficiency and productivity, and improve Systems engineering, s ...

company based in

Wotton-under-Edge Wotton-under-Edge is a market town and civil parish in the Stroud district of Gloucestershire, England. Near the southern fringe of the Cotswolds The Cotswolds ( ) is a region of central South West England, along a range of rolling hills ...

, England. The company's products include coordinate-measuring machines and machine tool products. It is listed on the

London Stock Exchange The London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange based in London, England. the total market value of all companies trading on the LSE stood at US$3.42 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Paul's Cath ...

and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.

History

The company was founded by Sir David McMurtry and John Deer in 1973. McMurtry had needed to measure fuel pipes on a prototype jet

engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power ge ...

: at the time, coordinate-measuring machine sensors featured rigid styli, which required manual positioning on the surface and which yielded poor repeatability when measuring delicate components. To meet this need, McMurtry invented a touch-trigger probe device, which he then

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an sufficiency of disclosure, enabling discl ...

ed. The probe featured an elegant 'kinematic' location for a spring-loaded stylus, providing a highly repeatable seated position for the stylus combined with the compliance needed to measure such components. Renishaw floated on the

Unlisted Securities Market The Unlisted Securities Market (USM), which ran from 1980 to 1996, was a stock exchange set up by the London Stock Exchange to cater for companies too small to qualify for a full listing. The USM allowed companies to be traded which did not have ...

in 1983, and gained a full listing on the

in November 1984. In 2006 the Company bought 'itp', a German manufacturer of precision styli. In early 2009 the

global recession A global recession is a recession that affects many countries around the world—that is, a period of global economic slowdown or declining economic output. Definitions The International Monetary Fund defines a global recession as "a decline ...

reached Renishaw, resulting in a large proportion of the workforce being placed "at risk". In 2010 Renishaw bought a stake (and subsequently took complete control) of Measuring Devices Ltd, a company providing a range of services in the field of surveying equipment. In 2011 Renishaw purchased the 400,000 sq ft Bosch plant in

Miskin Miskin () is a village approximately south of Llantrisant in the county borough of Rhondda Cynon Taf, Wales. The origin of the village was a small hamlet (place), hamlet known as New Mill, which grew up around New Mill farm. Miskin is part of ...

, Wales.

Operations

The company's product portfolio includes touch probes for CNC machine tools,

calibration In measurement technology and metrology, calibration is the comparison of measurement values delivered by a device under test with those of a calibration standard of known accuracy. Such a standard could be another measurement device of known ...

systems that optimise the performance of CNC machinery, linear encoder systems,

rotary encoder A rotary encoder, also called a shaft encoder, is an electro-mechanical device that converts the angle, angular position or motion of a shaft or axle to Analog signal, analog or Digital signal, digital output signals. There are two main types of ...

systems, additive manufacturing machines, dental CAD/CAM systems,

Raman spectroscopy Raman spectroscopy () (named after physicist C. V. Raman) is a Spectroscopy, spectroscopic technique typically used to determine vibrational modes of molecules, although rotational and other low-frequency modes of systems may also be observed. Ra ...

and medical devices for functional

neurosurgery Neurosurgery or neurological surgery, known in common parlance as brain surgery, is the specialty (medicine), medical specialty that focuses on the surgical treatment or rehabilitation of disorders which affect any portion of the nervous system ...

applications.

Locations

Renishaw's main offices are situated in

Gloucestershire Gloucestershire ( , ; abbreviated Glos.) is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by Herefordshire to the north-west, Worcestershire to the north, Warwickshire to the north-east, Oxfordshire ...

in an old

watermill A watermill or water mill is a mill that uses hydropower. It is a structure that uses a water wheel or water turbine to drive a mechanical process such as mill (grinding), milling (grinding), rolling, or hammering. Such processes are needed in ...

, with several new buildings on a site. The company has a machine shop located at Stonehouse, Gloucestershire, and an assembly facility at Woodchester, both near

Stroud Stroud is a market town and civil parish in Gloucestershire, England. It is the main town in Stroud District. The town's population was 13,500 in 2021. Sited below the western escarpment of the Cotswold Hills, at the meeting point of the ...

. There are further assembly facilities in

Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...

(

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

) and

Pune Pune ( ; , ISO 15919, ISO: ), previously spelled in English as Poona (List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1978), is a city in the state of Maharashtra in the Deccan Plateau, Deccan plateau in Western ...

(

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

). Renishaw also has research facilities located in

Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...

and

Ljubljana {{Infobox settlement , name = Ljubljana , official_name = , settlement_type = Capital city , image_skyline = {{multiple image , border = infobox , perrow = 1/2/2/1 , total_widt ...

Sale of Renishaw

On 2 March 2021, David McMurtry and John Deer indicated that they wished to dispose of their entire holdings in Renishaw, comprising some 53% of the shares, as 'we recognise that neither of us is getting any younger'. The Renishaw board then announced that it was launching a formal sale process for the entire company. This process was terminated on 7 July 2021, the board concluding that none of the proposals met their objectives.

References

External links

Official site
{{Authority control Engineering companies of the United Kingdom Companies listed on the London Stock Exchange Companies based in Stroud, Gloucestershire Technology companies established in 1973 Wotton-under-Edge 1973 establishments in England Companies in the FTSE 250 Index