Pre-drop
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| Private | |
| Industry | Roller coaster design |
| Founded | 1988 |
| Founder |
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| Headquarters | Monthey, Switzerland |
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Area served
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Worldwide |
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Key people
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| Products |
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Number of employees
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37 (2012) |
| Website | Official website |
Bolliger & Mabillard, abbreviated B&M and formally known as Bolliger & Mabillard Consulting Engineers Inc., is a roller coaster design consultancy based in Monthey, Switzerland. The company was founded in 1988 by Walter Bolliger and Claude Mabillard, with Bolliger as president and Mabillard as vice-president. Since 1988, B&M has built 100 roller coasters around the world and have pioneered several new ride technologies, most notably the inverted roller coaster. Since 1990, all coasters designed by B&M that have been built within North America have been manufactured by Clermont Steel Fabricators which is located in Batavia, Ohio, United States. B&M started with four employees and has since grown; as of 2012 it employs 37 people, mostly engineers and draftsmen. In 2016 the company completed its 100th coaster.
Walter Bolliger and Claude Mabillard starting working for Giovanola, a manufacturing company who supplied rides to Intamin, in the 1970s. During their time at Giovanola, they helped design the company's first stand-up roller coaster, Shockwave at Six Flags Magic Mountain. They also worked on other projects, such as Z-Force at Six Flags Great America. Bolliger & Mabillard left Giovanola, but the company continued to use their track design, so the company's roller coasters, Goliath at Six Flags Magic Mountain and Titan at Six Flags Over Texas, use a track style very similar to B&M's.
In 1987, Giovanola underwent a change of management; Bolliger & Mabillard decided to leave, and founded their own company. At the time, B&M employed four people; two draftsmen, Bolliger, and Mabillard. When B&M was created, the pair had agreed not to make any more amusement attractions. However, Six Flags contacted the new company and asked it to build a roller coaster. B&M accepted the offer and hired two more draftsmen. But B&M had a problem regarding how and where to manufacture the track pieces for the roller coaster. With the impression of the work done by Clermont Steel Fabricators on Vortex at Kings Island and Shockwave Six Flags Great America, Walter Bolliger went to the steel plant and asked if they would be interested in manufacturing the track. Clermont Steel Fabricators accepted and currently manufactures all Bolliger and Mabillard roller coaster track pieces for all of North America. Now with a company to manufacture the track, B&M built its first roller coaster, a stand-up roller coaster, Iron Wolf, which opened in 1990 at Six Flags Great America. Two years later, Bolliger & Mabillard built another project for Six Flags Great America, Batman: The Ride, the world's first Inverted Coaster, which brought them to prominence in the industry.
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Wikipedia