Davis-Standard Division of Crompton & Knowles Corp. has obtained its first European capacity to make extruders by acquiring McNeil Akron Repiquet sarl, in a deal announced Jan. 25. Repiquet makes plastics and rubber extrusion machines at a plant in Dannemarie, France, and has a sales and service office in the Paris area. Davis-Standard will continue to manufacture Repiquet-brand machines.
Terms were not disclosed for the cash purchase of Repiquet, which has annual sales of about $10 million.
Davis-Standard, based in Pawcatuck, Conn., is coming off a strong fiscal 1994, which ended Dec. 31. Its sales reached $196.2 million, a 30 percent increase from 1993 sales of $151 million.
Most of that $45.2 million gain came from the purchase of John Brown Inc.'s Egan Machinery Division, which makes machines to produce plastic film. Egan's sales had been about $35 million before the purchase. But Crompton & Knowles said other sectors of the plastics equipment business also showed improved results in 1994.
Davis-Standard's operating profit increased 20 percent, to $31.2 million from $26 million in 1993. The specialty equipment division closed 1994 with an order backlog of $66 million, significantly more than the $38 million backlog at the prior year's end.
Davis-Standard accounted for one-third of Crompton & Knowles' total business in 1994. Crompton's sales were $589.8 million, up 6 percent from sales of $558.3 million in 1993. Net earnings declined, to $50.9 million, from $51.9 million the year before.
Crompton & Knowles, based in Stamford, Conn., blamed the flat corporate wide numbers on sluggish sales of apparel, a major market for its dyes. International sales of dyes suffered because of lower demand under an existing supply agreement, said Vincent Calarco, Crompton's chairman, president and chief executive officer. ``We were unable to completely overcome these weaknesses despite an outstanding year in our specialty equipment business,'' he said.
Repiquet, Davis-Standard's new French connection, had been a sister company of McNeil & NRM Inc. in Akron, Ohio, which was owned by a holding company headed by Paris businessman Paul Yared. Davis-Standard bought the NRM line of plastics extrusion machines in 1994.
The Jan. 25 announcement follows several months of rumors that Davis-Standard wanted to buy Repiquet.
Besides extruders, Davis-Standard also makes industrial blow molding machines, wire-coating systems and machinery controllers.