Bolliger & Mabillard, officially Bolliger & Mabillard Consulting Engineers, Inc. and often abbreviated B&M, is a roller coaster design consultancy based in Monthey, Switzerland. The company was founded in 1988 by Walter Bolliger and Claude Mabillard, both of whom had worked for Giovanola. B&M has pioneered several new ride technologies, most notably the inverted roller coaster and the box-section track. In 2016, the company completed its 100th roller coaster. B&M produces nine types of coaster models: Stand-Up Coaster, Inverted Coaster, Floorless Coaster, Flying Coaster, Hyper Coaster, Dive Coaster, Sitting Coaster, Wing Coaster and Family Coaster. Though B&M has not used the term, the company has also manufactured three giga coasters. History Roots Walter Bolliger and Claude Mabillard started 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; 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. Launch In 1987, Giovanola underwent a change of management, and B&M decided to leave and create their own company. At the time, B&M employed four people, including two draftsmen: Bolliger and Mabillard. When B&M was created, the pair had agreed not to make any more amusement attractions. However, Robert Mampe, Six Flags Great America's staff engineer, had worked with both men during the construction of Z-Force; he contacted the newly-formed company and asked them to reconfigure the cars for their Giovanola-built, Intamin bobsled coaster, to be relocated from Six Flags Great Adventure. Following that project, Mampe asked the new company to design and build a stand-up roller coaster for Six Flags Great America, similar to Shockwave at Six Flags Magic Mountain. 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 favorable history of the work done by Clermont Steel Fabricators (on Vortex, 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 to this