Chinese expansion adds zip to Coats

Coats, the zip and thread maker owned by Sir Ron Brierley's Guinness Peat Group, is operating on a grand scale in China.

A new factory complex in southern China being officially opened on Thursday will produce 25 million metres of zips and 6000 tonnes of thread a year.

GPG director Tony Gibbs said the new factory facilitieswere state of the art and they were in China because that was where the company's apparel making customers were.

The factory, costing US$38 million ($55.5 million), will employ 2000 people.

Coats is the world's biggest manufacturer of thread. It has six other sites in China. The new site includes a zip factory, a thread factory and a dye house.