An Ebbw Vale factory has undergone a major expansion and created new jobs with help from NatWest.

Express Contract Drying, which manufactures colourings and flavourings for the food and pharmaceutical industries, has installed new machinery and taken on 18 more staff.

The company started in Tregaron, mid Wales, in 1991 and opened its plant on the Rassau Industrial Estate in 2001.

Managing director David McDermott has invested £3m in the Gwent site in the past three years, building an extension to accommodate the new equipment, which has significantly increased the plant’s capacity.

Now the firm has capacity across its two sites to manufacture nine tonnes a day of its products, including flavourings for crisps, cereals, bakery goods and soup.

The latest machine to be installed in Ebbw Vale is a micro-encapsulation machine, which takes the moisture out of food products, leaving behind a flavouring or colour in powder form.

It has been designed by Mr McDermott, and took around two years to go from drawing board to operation.

“I think we have invested at the right time,” he said. “When the country wasn’t doing so well I decided that was the time to start planning ahead - in a recession you want to be at a point where you’re ready and waiting for the upturn.

“It’s also a good time to invest in Ebbw Vale. We’re an international business, not just one which sells on our doorstep, and with the improvements in the road network around Blaenau Gwent we are going to be very well connected. For instance, we’ll be able to get to Birmingham in about an hour. There will be no reason why this area won’t be as attractive to business as the South West currently is.”

Mr McDermott worked with NatWest and the bank’s asset finance arm, Lombard, to finance the latest machine.

NatWest relationship director Graham Harvey said: “Manufacturing has long been the lifeblood of the Gwent valleys and it’s great to support a business which is creating new jobs and investing in the area. We wish Express Contract Drying every success and look forward to continuing to support Mr McDermott and his workforce in the future.”