# Breton (company)

Breton S.p.A. is an Italian, privately held company established in 1963 that produces machines and plants for engineered stone and metalworking. Machines and plants by Breton can be used in diverse sectors such as die-making, aerospace, automotive, racing cars, energy, gears, general mechanics, stone processing and kitchen top manufacturing.

## History

Breton was established in 1963 in Castello di Godego, Italy, by Marcello Toncelli, who started developing new technologies and manufacturing industrial plants for producing engineered stone. He invented Bretonstone technology, also known as vibrocompression under vacuum, a patented technology which is used today by engineered stone manufacturers. Around the mid-1990s, the company decided to expand into the machine tool market, manufacturing machining centres for the mechanical industry.
In 2003, Marcello Toncelli died, and the control of the company passed to his sons Luca and Dario Toncelli, who have been running the company since together with Roberto Chiavacci, Vice President of the board of directors.
In 2011, the company acquired Bidese Impianti and signed a partnership with Boart & Wire, a diamond wires manufacturer. In 2014, Breton became an official member of the Graphene Flagship Project, one of the largest research initiatives of the European Commission which focuses on the potential applications of graphene.

## Products

Breton manufactures machines and technology for following fields:
* engineered stone processing
* natural stone processing
* ceramic materials processing
* high-speed machining for aerospace, formula 1, automotive and die-mould sector

## Awards

Breton's solution to connect through the cloud to manage tele-service for 4,000 machines for hundreds of customers worldwide was awarded by Microsoft in 2012 with the Windows Embedded Partner Excellence Award for manufacturing.

## Footnotes

* ↑ "Company overview of Breton S.p.A." investing.businessweek.com/. BusinessWeek.com. Archived from the original on March 17, 2014. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
* ↑ "Stone Equipment". www.dmoz.org/. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
* ↑ Impelluso, Thomas J. "Italian machines that make machines". www.utsandiego.com/. The San Diego Union-Tribune. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
* ↑ "Marcello Toncelli Biography". Retrieved 14 July 2014.
* ↑ Moriarty, Ann Marie. "Diamonds Are Forever. These Counters May Be Too" (PDF). The Washington Post. Archived from the original (PDF) on 9 May 2006. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
* ↑ "Process for the manufacturing of slabs or blocks of conglomerate of stone granulate and polyester resin". patents.justia.com/. Justia Patents. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
* ↑ Technology used by most leading engineered stone manufacturers - according to International Surface Fabricators Association Archived April 8, 2014, at the Wayback Machine
* ↑ "Breton Acquires Wire-Saw Maker Bideseimpiani". www.stoneupdate.com/. Stone update. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
* ↑ "Commission announces huge new influx of partners to the Graphene Flagship project". europa.eu/. European Commission. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
* ↑ "Machinery : Breton Shapemill NCF". www.naturalstonespecialist.com/. Natural Stone Specialist. Archived from the original on 3 April 2015. Retrieved 14 July 2014.
* ↑ Javnozon, Dan. "Microsoft Honors Winners of the Windows Embedded Partner Excellence Awards". Msdn.com. Retrieved 28 February 2014.
* ↑ "Custom Manufacturer of Stone Products Improves Productivity by 30 Percent". Microsoft.com. Retrieved 13 April 2014.