South Yorkshire companies have secured four out of the 15 Queen's Awards for Enterprise won by Yorkshire and Humber firms.
Independent Forgings and Alloys, Sheffield Forgemasters International and Gripple, from Sheffield, and Huthwaite International, from Rotherham, all won awards for international trade.
Independent Forgings and Alloys' won its award for more than trebling exports over the past three years.
The Owlerton business, which makes specialist open die forgings, rings and precision rotary forged bars, exports to Europe, North America, India, the Middle East and South East Asia and has developed new markets in Turkey, Argentina, Brazil and China.
This year's Queen's Award is Sheffield Forgemasters International's third.
The group's foundry – previously known as River Don Castings - won Export and Technology Awards in 1989 and 1997 respectively.
Brightside Lane-based Forgemasters is a world leader in the development and manufacture of large steel forgings and castings for the defence, power generation, nuclear, offshore oil, metal processing and construction industries.
Over the last three years, its export sales have increased by £19 million, and nearly two thirds of its production is exported. Main markets include Germany, China, Russia, Norway and Spain.
Gripple's Queen's Award is its second and comes 20 years after the launch of the original "Gripple" wire joiner and tensioner.
The company won its first Queen's Award in 2000, for innovation and has a host of other accolades to its name. Only last week it unveiled details of a pioneering deal with continental construction industry tools giant Hilti.
Approaching 300 million Gripples have been sold to more than 2,000 customers in the construction, wine and fencing sectors in 85 countries worldwide in the 20 years since its invention. Between 2003 and 2006, international sales grew by 53 per cent and represented more than 80 per cent of turnover.
Wentworth-based Huthwaite International clinched its second Queen's Award for increasing export sales by 138 per cent in three years.
The sales and management training and consultancy business does business in 30 countries, in Europe, the Middle East, India, Africa and the Asia Pacific region.
Huthwaite, founded in 1974, operates a network of licensees in more than 20 countries, supported by regular visits, local language web-sites and training.
READ MOREYour letters.
Today's features.Latest sport.Main news index.The full article contains 384 words and appears in Sheffield Star newspaper.
