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Nigel Atherton provides the inside track on 40 years of XYZ Machine Tools Nigel Atherton, the Managing Director of XYZ Machine Tools, recently took time to reflect on 40 years of trading since he founded the business in 1984. His thoughts touch on what has changed, how the company has grown and what the future holds for the UK’s largest supplier of CNC machine tools.
Nigel Atherton was just 22 when he launched XYZ. Like many things in life, it was little more than circumstance that prompted the ambitious young engineer to embark on a career of entrepreneurship. “I served an apprenticeship building machine tools, the latter years of which focused on demonstrating CNC systems,” he explains.
“Remarkably, the company I worked for in Yorkshire was unconvinced about the future of CNC. Unhappy with this stance I left to work for a company in Nottingham. However, it was tough times economically and unfortunately the
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