Filtration Industry.

Approximately 70% of the Company’s annual revenue is associated with the sale of a broad array of filters and related components. The remaining 30% involves the manufacture of spargers, restrictors and a variety of other products.

Metal filters have developed niche markets where the characteristics of metal provide added value (i.e., in cases where high temperatures, high pressures, or chemicals corrosive to less expensive media are involved).

In addition, a significant market has been developed in self-cleaning process filters which rely on the capability of porous metal to withstand high pressures. These filters can operate and clean themselves automatically, thereby eliminating the cost of filter change out and the exposure of operators to carcinogenic or hazardous materials, as well as minimizing disposal costs. This market is expected to grow significantly as disposal costs increase, and public and governmental pressure on environmental cleanup accelerates.

Ceramic filters with comparable pressure, temperature, and chemical resistance characteristics compete with metal filters in these markets. However, ceramics suffer from relative brittleness and require ancillary materials to seal the ceramic tube into a metal connector or housing.

The large majority of filtration products are designed to remove particulate matter in the size range of 0.05 to 75 microns. Mott’s products filter particulates from liquids in the range of 0.1 to 100 microns and filter particulates from gasses to below 0.003 microns. The filter line includes patented GasShield^® PENTA^® High Purity gas filters that serve the growing worldwide semiconductor market, where finer chip linewidths require exacting standards of particulate removal. This market offers high growth potential since metal filters are perceived to be the filter of choice in an established sub-market in excess of $70 million annually.

In the semiconductor gas filtration market, there are three significant players in metal filtration. Mott was the first to market in nickel and maintains a 30% market share. The remainder of the market consists of companies in specialized niches, none of which have a significant market share. The GasShield^® PENTA^® filter media allows Mott to compete in the Teflon^® portion of the high purity gas market.