"Shoot for the moon. If you miss, maybe you'll hit a star."
Those 12 words express the philosophy that has guided University of Rhode Island alumnus
Richard M. Oster all his life.
As group chief executive of the London-based Cookson Group plc, Oster has spearheaded the
conglomerate's growth into a global manufacturing powerhouse with more than 125
subsidiaries and 13,000 employees in more than 40 countries and 200 locations.
Oster says he plans to shoot for the moon by driving Cookson Group plc to double profits
in three years and triple them in five.
"Nobody thought we could achieve the goals we achieved in the past. They thought they
were too difficult. They thought they couldn't be done. But we rose to it because we had
the business, the people, the growth in the industries we served," said Oster.
While expanding globally into a $3 billion organization, Oster has remained committed to
the economic health of the Ocean State. Oster demonstrated his belief in developing the
industrial potential of Rhode Island by locating the headquarters for Cookson America, the
company's North American division, in Providence's Union Station.
Cookson America maintains a strong presence in both Rhode Island and Massachusetts, which
are home to more than a dozen Cookson companies. They play an integral role in the dynamic
growth of Cookson as a manufacturer of plastics, ceramics, electronic materials and
engineered products.
Cookson sprang up from modest beginnings, founded in 1704 in the port city of Newcastle on
Tyne in England by Isaac Cookson as a supplier of lead before the dawn of the Industrial
Revolution. Cookson embodied the entrepreneurial spirit that has been passed down through
generations of Cookson leadership -- as the company began to expand ambitiously in the
19th century.
Cookson occupies a legendary place in the development of metals in the industrial world,
contributing lead to the creation of the Eiffel Tower and the Brooklyn Bridge.
Oster began to mold Cookson into the industrial giant it is today after his family's
brassware business, the Providence-based A.J. Oster Company, was acquired by the
London-based Lead Industries Group in 1979. The acquisition provided Oster with the
opportunity to head up a new North American division, called Cookson America, with the
advantage of having the Lead Industries Group provide the capital to acquire American
companies.
The Lead Industries Group became the Cookson Group plc in 1982, an accurate reflection of
the evolution and change that marked the building of an industrial enterprise that has
become a leader in industrial materials, advanced ceramics and specialty plastics. Cookson
has forged a global industrial role through the conversion of primary or secondary raw
materials into products needed by manufacturers and assemblers.
Cookson has thrived through the group chief executive's policy of teamwork within a
decentralized corporate structure. He gives his subordinates at Cookson America and all
the divisions within Cookson Group plc the "freedom to succeed."
"What separates us is we listen well," Oster says. "We get out and visit
our customers and listen to what they have to say. We have a program we call 'Champions
and Rainmakers.' Those are people that make things happen, people not afraid to take a few
risks."
On a more personal level he says, "I try to hire people around me who can pass me by.
That's my goal, however difficult it is to do. I sincerely try to do that and I get the
biggest kick when young people really succeed and do something brilliant."
Cookson's electronic materials division is a world leader in the supply of materials and
equipment used in printed circuit boards. The company employs a unique synergistic
approach within the electronic materials division, which is characteristic of all four
divisions. The result is a sharing of information between companies while never losing
sight of a company's individual autonomy or market focus.
"In electronic materials we are already the number one worldwide supplier of
materials to the printed circuit board and assembly industry," said Oster.
Falling within the electronics purview is Oster Alloys, Inc. in Providence, which
manufactures white metal casting alloys. Oster Alloys is a major supplier of pewter
flat-rolled products to the flatware industry. With its manufacture of casting alloys as
well as the thermostatic printing process that embeds indelible graphics on computer
keyboards, Cookson has made significant contribution to the environmental improvement of
the industries in which it operates.
Another company contributing to the success of the electronics component of Cookson is
Key-Tech, Inc. in Cranston, which has created and patented a process used to decorate
computer keyboards and appliances.
Cookson's Arconium Specialty Alloys Corp. in Providence is one of only three
fully-integrated indium producers in the world. Cookson is proud of this distinction
because indium, when refined, is in high demand by the electronics industry.
At Cookson's Poly-Flex Circuits, Inc. in Cranston, the company has lowered production
costs and increased design flexibility while reducing the environmental impact through its
additive polymer circuit technology, which is used in computer keyboards, and electronic
components.
"Our strategy is to expand internationally and to diversify our product range,"
says Oster. Engineered products are one of the company's great cash generators that help
fund the group's other businesses, he said. The Stern Leach Co. in Attleboro and the
Stern/Vennerbeck Co. in Lincoln employ 400 workers between them, with both companies
dedicated to the manufacture of precious metals materials for the jewelry industry.
General Metal Finishing in Attleboro services the commercial electronics, military,
medical, automotive, and telecommunication industries with specification plating.
Another Cookson company in Attleboro -- Cookson's Brainin-Advance Industries, is one of
the country's largest producers of small and miniature precision stampings and assemblies
for semiconductor and electrical applications. Its innovative processes and assembly
techniques have enabled it to compete with companies many times its size.
While Cookson is renowned in the fields of sheet, rod, wire, tubing, precious metal dental
attachments and coin blanks, it has also gained considerable notice with its development
of novel bearing technology by KMC, Inc. in Coventry.
Protected by more than 50 U.S. and worldwide patents, Cookson's bearing technology can
replace both rolling element and hydrodynamic bearings in a wide range of machinery.
Cookson has been lauded by the U.S. Department of Energy for these innovations as being
the most significant breakthrough in bearing technology in decades.
"In the niche market we serve in fiber optics, we are the number two worldwide in the
production of specialty fiber optics materials to the fast-growing telecommunications and
cable television industries," said Oster. "These are critical niche markets and
our growth potential is high," he added.
With a staff of almost 200, Neptco, Inc. in Pawtucket manufactures materials to support
the wire and cable industry as part of Cookson's Plastics division. These products form
the core of fiber optic cable, and shield electronic and cable TV cables from interference
and inhibit signal loss.
Years of developing expertise in materials science has resulted in Cookson gaining
dominance as the largest, broadest-based supplier of metallic stearates, stabilizers,
flame retardants and hundreds of other individual products.
One of the most innovative developments to emerge from its intensive research is polymeric
salts that are significantly less toxic, and function better in extreme high temperatures.
These salts now serve as a substitute for asbestos in such applications as head gaskets.
Cookson's ceramics division is in the forefront as a designer and producer of advanced
refractories and slide gates for the steel, glass, and foundry industries. It is also a
leading supplier worldwide of materials to the tile, tableware, and sanitaryware
industries.
"We are committed to being number one in the world in ceramic supplies in three
years' time," said Oster. "Our growth potential is medium to high. Our strategy
is to widen the markets we are already serving, develop new markets, and develop new
products for our existing customers," he added.
Cookson has made significant inroads into the emerging steel markets in Latin America,
Asia, and Eastern Europe with new facilities on line in Brazil, India, and the Czech
Republic.
This has come about after the company gained leading market share positions in Europe and
the United States. A recent joint venture with Japan's foremost steel producer to
manufacture one of its extensive product lines is accelerating Cookson's growth there and
throughout the Pacific Rim.
When asked what the future holds for Cookson, he cites three objectives: develop existing
businesses that have a worldwide market potential, develop the company's technological
strengths and achieve the highest standards of customer service.
He plans for Cookson to reach its goals by always asking himself and his staff three
questions.
"How Much? How much doesn't mean selling at the lowest price. It means delivering the
best value," Oster says.
"How good? How good means developing tomorrow's technologies today faster than your
competition," he continues.
Finally, Oster asks, "How fast? We like to deliver better quality and the highest
technology to our customers faster and better than our competition. If we do that all the
time, we'll win all the time."
Cookson has succeeded by a constant drive to be forward looking in planning for the
future. To that end, it has developed Vision 2000, which summarizes its corporate
objectives and management style.
The core of Cookson's philosophy toward future growth can be summed up in a statement from
the summary: "Cookson is determined to strive to continue to be a solid, well
managed, profit-oriented business with an acute concern for maintaining its secure
foundation for the future."
As Oster says, "The keys to achievement of Cookson's mission and goals are the
maintenance of a common understanding among the three elements of the company's structure:
product line profit centers, staffs and corporate leadership, and the contribution of
superior performance by everyone."
Richard Oster like to win. As he has often been quoted as saying, "Winning is fun.
You show me a good loser and I'll show you a loser . You only live once so why not be the
best you can be?"