Ulrich Seats - Excellence and Innovation

Ulrich Seats (Pty) Ltd is a privately owned company, specializing in the manufacture of passenger and driver / operator seats.

We manufacture from first principles to our own designs as well as manufacture / assembly under license where necessary.

Market Review

Charles Brittz and Corrie Olivier are celebrating 25 years with the Company

Ulrich seats (Pty) Ltd has for more than twenty five years weathered the storms and experienced exponential growth in the business of manufacturing transport seating in South Africa.

It started with the production of passenger seats for bus body builders, at a plant in Sebenza industrial area in Edenvale. the new owners - Corrie Olivier and Charles Brittz - had successfully acquired  the company through a management buy-out, and they then set forth to implement their vision to become and remain the supplier of choice for passenger seats in public transport.

Bus body builders faced difficulties with their rigid in-house seat production facilities, which were unable to  meet demand in the market place for a wider range of applications. the industry was also centralised and inflexible.

Ulrich Seats charted a new path: semi-luxury commuter seats were designed as single mode seating with higher backs- as opposed to old bench type seats - and introduced to widen the bus passenger product range. Ulrich Seats had mission to supply correct products at the right price, through excellent service to clients

The company went form strength to strength, maximising on its values of an open and transparent management system based on ethical principles.

When Ulrich Seats( Pty) Ltd needed to increase its manufacturing capacity, it moved to a new facility in Olifantsfontein, Midrand, in 1995. From the production of set a of 65 seats per day, the company increased its volumes to a rate of three sets a day- including a variety of train passenger and operator seats. The premises are closer to the source of raw materials and closer to end users.

Ulrich Seats has produced over 500 000 seats in the past twenty years. These include bus passenger seats, driver and operator seats, rail passenger sets, and export orders for military vehicle seats for a large number of countries.

Among the highlights, the company has been awarded substantial tenders from Transnet Rail Agency for the manufacturing of rail passenger seats. Ulrich Seats is a major supplier of bus passenger seats to some of the major bus body builders as well as bus operators. The company also counts on the USA, Canada and lately India, as clients for custom designed seats for military applications. It has also supplied the new Gautrain feeder buses with passenger seats.

In 2009 Ulrich Seats enterd into a equity share transaction with Matsheloni Seats Consortium to improve its empowerment credentials and to reposition itself with a strong competitive edge as a supplier of choice to clients 

SWHAP Final Awards - Most Innovative Intervention