GR Technical Services Inc. and Graber-Rogg Inc. have boosted their European presence through an alliance with two injection molders that are affiliates of Edgbaston Group in the United Kingdom. GR of Mountainside, N.J., and Graber-Rogg of Cranford, N.J., expect to capture more business in automotive and consumer-products markets as a result of the alliance, said Art Garcia, GR's vice president of sales and marketing. The alliance will target companies that manufacture globally and require regional suppliers.
GR provides pre-production services such as design, modeling and tooling. Graber-Rogg is a custom injection molder with most of its presses in the 300- to 750-ton range of clamping force. Plastic Engineering Ltd., based in Leamington, England, specializes in press capacity of 50-350 tons. The other Edgbaston affiliate, Plasmatic Ltd. of Leicester, England, has presses of 750-1,000 tons.
Garcia said his company and Graber-Rogg, a sister firm, also have alliances in Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong and elsewhere in China. GR plans to expand its pre-production skills through other partnerships with industrial design companies, he said in a telephone interview.
The alliance with the British molders was helped by Robert Smallwood, a British national who is president of New York investment advisory firm Atlantic Venture International Inc.
Plastic Engineering recently expanded and moved to a 62,000-square-foot facility in Leamington. It spent about 500,000 ($815,000) on the move. Garcia said the expansion was planned before Plastic Engineering teamed up with GR and Graber-Rogg.
GR and Graber-Rogg have total sales of about $28 million annually. Plastic Engineering and Plasmatic each have sales of less than $20 million a year, Garcia estimated.