Metro Mold purchases Imperial Custom
ROGERS, MINN. - Injection molder and toolmaker Metro Mold & Design Inc. has acquired fellow Rogers molder and mold maker Imperial Custom Molding Inc., in a deal for an undisclosed amount.
Executives for the companies were unavailable to discuss the purchase. Imperial's previous owner, financial group Quazar Capital Corp., announced the sale in a Nov. 22 news release.
Both firms have molding and make injection mold tooling, but the purchase of ICM and its 200 employees adds new capabilities to Metro Mold. ICM also has thermoset molding capabilities and has blow molding and clean room production, with a contract to make bottles and other parts for the medical industry.
Both companies also are involved in making bipolar plates for fuel cells, though using two different approaches, with Metro Mold machining metal plates and ICM compression molding thermoset plates.
Printpack acquires label maker Seal-It
ATLANTA - Film and sheet maker Printpack Inc. of Atlanta will acquire Farmingdale, N.Y.-based Seal-It Inc. for an undisclosed sum.
The deal allows Printpack to venture into new, but related, segments of the film and packaging market.
Seal-It, according to a Nov. 20 news release about the deal, is a leader in the manufacturing of shrink sleeves and labels made from PVC, polylactide, glycol-modified PET and oriented polystyrene. Company officials could not be reached for comment.
Sharon Lobel, Seal-It's president and founder, will stay on as a full-time consultant following the acquisition's close.
Privately held Printpack is the fourth-largest film and sheet manufacturer in North America with $1.2 billion in sales, according to Plastics News data. It employs 4,000 and operates 23 manufacturing plants in the U.S., Mexico and Great Britain.
Republic Plastics to make foam cups
OKLAHOMA CITY - Republic Plastics Ltd., an extruder and thermoformer of disposable tableware, has taken over the foam-cup-making plant formerly run by Heartland Cup Inc. in Oklahoma City.
Heartland parent AMS Health Sciences Inc. of Oklahoma City announced the divestiture Nov. 20.
McQueeny, Texas-based Republic assumed the lease on the Heartland plant and its equipment, with an option to buy it that runs from Nov. 15, 2007, to Nov. 15, 2008.
Under the equipment lease, Republic will pay AMS $33,000 per month, according to an AMS news release.
Republic officials were unavailable for comment.
``The acquisition ... will give us a foam cup product line extension to supplement our foam tableware business,'' Republic Chief Executive Officer Gino Inman said in the release.
Republic makes private-label plates, bowls, saucers and lunch trays sold through big-box and grocery retailers like Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Kroger.
Magna entering Russian auto market
Aurora, Ontario - Auto supplier Magna International Inc. has agreed to a partnership that will help it expand into the Russian auto manufacturing market.
A memorandum of understanding with GAZ Group LLC and Russian Machines JSC will provide a backbone for operations in Russia, including interior and exterior plastics and die stamping. The firms signed the agreement Nov. 18.
Russian Machines, a main shareholder of GAZ of Nizhny Novgorod, will work with Magna not only on creating the production capabilities, but also for training, joint engineering projects and the development of a local supply base. GAZ stands for Gorkovsky Avtomobilny Zavod, or Gorky automobile plant.
Aurora-based Magna is one of the world's biggest auto suppliers, with more than US$22.5 billion in sales in 2005. Its plastics-related holdings include its Decoma exteriors unit, Intier interiors group and Magna Donnelly, a mirror and glass enclosures specialist.
Magna has no exposure in Russia, where auto production is predicted to make a steady climb in the next decade. Analysts at consulting group CSM Worldwide of Northville, Mich., expect the country will turn out more than 2.1 million cars by 2012.
Magna has production sites in Poland and Slovakia.