DA Techs Ltd, which specialises in wheel refurbishments, has received an £80,000 loan from Rosebud, a product managed by GC Business Finance.

The firm was introduced to Rosebud by Caroline Turley of the Lancashire County Council’s Access to Finance service.

Based in in Adlington in Lancashire, DA Techs refurbishes and manufactures diamond cut alloy wheels. The objective is to get the wheels back to a show-room standard, so the car can be sold. Its customers include local franchise dealers, independent customers and insurance providers. The firm currently has a workshop in Adlington and two vans, enabling the business to operate remotely.

DA Techs recently secured a national contract with a major fleet organisation, taking in finance vehicles and servicing them in order to get back to dealership standard. It provides jobs for 16 people in Lancashire, who refurbish around 20,000 wheels per year.

The funding provided by Rosebud has allowed DA Techs to create a first-of-its-kind wheel refurbishment pod which is based in the South East. It was designed from scratch and purpose-built with a spray room and tyre machine in order to enable efficient and on-site refurbishment. The benefits of the pod are that it can operate on premises around the country within three hours of being placed on site, allowing the company to service wheels at the client’s convenience.

The company has future plans to replicate this model, as well as franchising its facilities and privately leasing the pods. It also has plans to increase its head count by four people in Lancashire within the next six months.

GC Business Finance was appointed to deliver Lancashire County Council’s Rosebud Fund in July 2019. The £11.25m investment fund provides loans ranging from £10,000 to £300,000 to businesses across 12 local authority areas in the region and is aiming to create 150 jobs per year across Lancashire.

Phil Barnard, director at DA Techs Ltd said: “At DA Techs, we saw a gap in the market in creating a wheel refurbishment pod and saw the benefits of making our services portable.

This has enabled further job creation for the area, as well as in the South East where our pod is based. This has allowed us to be easily accessible when serving clients and we hope to build on this momentum going forward and win more big contracts. From the beginning, the Rosebud team understood our business model and were able to provide the funding to support our growth. We look forward to working with the team in the future to enable us to roll this model out across the country.”

Jonathan Nelson, fund manager at Rosebud said: “DA Techs is a great example of a Lancashire-founded business with national growth potential. With its recent national contract win, it was a perfect time to support them with this investment and help towards creating this refurbishment facility. The one of a kind pod will allow the team to grow both regionally and nationally, while expanding its client base across the UK. We are excited to continue our work with DA Techs and to work with them as their business continues its exciting growth plans this year.”

Caroline Turley of Access to Finance said: “I have really enjoyed working with the team at DA Tech, together we built a business funding strategy and identified appropriate funders. Supporting the board through the funding process helped them to focus on the key areas of finance raising, enabling this busy team to make the right decisions quickly and efficiently.”

County councillor Michael Green, Lancashire County Council, said: “Rosebud provides vital funding to support high-growth businesses across Lancashire and DA Techs is a perfect example of a company in the region that has huge potential to grow. It’s great to see that the company has took advantage of the support services Lancashire has to offer, such as Access to Finance, which can point business owners in the right direction. We encourage other business owners to tap into services such as this as well as the Boost programme to help them achieve their ambitions.”