Steve Biddle, a control valve specialist with more than twenty years’ experience in the oil and gas industries, has been appointed Regional Operations Manager for Scotland, with responsibility for Severn Unival’s important workshop facilities at Aberdeen and Grangemouth. Mr Biddle will be responsible for introducing a stronger and consolidated service for customers in both areas by co-ordinating and optimising the service availability at both centres. Severn Unival’s valve management capabilities are further enhanced by the appointment of Russell Owen as Head of Design at the company’s headquarters in Huddersfield. Mr Owen’s appointment coincides with the introduction of upgraded Solid Edge CAD and rapid prototyping facilities, together with enhanced drafting and interfacing with the latest casting technologies. These facilities are fully integrated with Severn Glocon’s manufacturing systems in the UK and India to ensure that a rapid transfer of technologies is available to Unival’s customers from the entire pool of the group’s international design resource. Severn Unival has also benefited from two further recently announced developments. In the first the company has formed a partnership with Invensys to provide a fully integrated management, performance improvement and delivery service for the complete process loop. In the second, Design Paradigm Ltd has been acquired by the Severn Glocon Group to provide additional expertise in the area of FEED design, product verification, performance analysis and criticality studies.