Statistical Plastics Corp. could be a new custom molder in the making. The start-up company isn't saying yet whether it will parlay its sampling and short-run capabilities into a full-throttle molding operation. That prospect is yet undetermined, said Jim O'Brien, president of sister firm O&S Designs Inc. But SPC's 65,000-square-foot plant in Germantown, Wis., will support 16-20 injection molding machines, he noted. How soon will those presses be in place?
``It will happen eventually,'' he said by phone Nov. 29.
In October, SPC broke ground on the $2.5 million plant, which will be in operation by May 1 with at least four presses, to do mold sampling and small runs, and a toolroom for product and mold design. Currently, those four presses work out of a 10,000-square-foot, leased space in nearby Menomonee Falls, Wis.
O'Brien pegged the SPC investment at about $4 million. In a private stock offering, SPC raised more than $1 million of that total from employees of its sister firms, O'Brien said.
In fact, SPC is the most-recent addition to the MGS Group, which includes O&S Designs Inc., an injection mold and product design house; Moldmakers Inc.; and Prototype Mold & Design Inc. Those three outfits, which occupy separate buildings on the same block in Menomonee Falls, employ about 160, he said.
Mark Sellers, who built MGS from the ground up into a full-service group of firms, is its chief executive. When he and O'Brien founded the first company, Moldmakers, in 1982, it employed four, O'Brien said.
The group's biggest customers are electronics, computer, medical and automotive firms. The MGS plastics companies expect sales of $20 million for their fiscal year ending in July, he said.
The new plant sits on 11 acres in Germantown, which can accommodate three such plants, he noted, alluding to future growth. He would not say how many workers SPC will employ, but an MGS news release said the group will hire 15 by the time the plant opens in May.