Georgia Gulf to close Canadian plant
ATLANTA - Georgia Gulf Corp. announced Aug. 24 it will close Royal Group Inc.'s vinyl window and door profile extrusion plant in Winnipeg, Manitoba, by year's end.
The Winnipeg facility employs about 45, said Royal Group spokesman Mark Badger in a telephone interview.
Royal will transfer the capacity to other company-operated window and door plants in North America.
``It's fair to say that other facilities in the Royal Group network are advantaged by way of technology,'' Badger said. ``We're blessed with a network of window and door profile facilities throughout North America. We're also blessed with some innovative new technologies.''
Bill Doherty, Atlanta-based Georgia Gulf's vice president of custom products, said in a news release that customers previously served by the Winnipeg plant will receive better service from the plants ``with the latest in extrusion technology.''
Royal Group has 12 window and door profile extrusion facilities in six locations: Toronto; Montreal; Pittsburgh; Reno, Nev.; Bristol, Tenn.; and Seattle.
The Bristol plant opened in May.
Georgia Gulf, a resin and aromatics maker, bought Royal Group in October.
Johns Manville building factory in Ala.
DENVER - Building products maker Johns Manville is building a new, 164,000-square-foot plant in Scottsboro, Ala., where the company will manufacture thermoplastic polyolefin roofing membrane.
The plant is expected to come on line in the second half of 2008.
The TPO sheet plant represents Denver-based JM's first thermoplastic membrane production facility, company officials said, adding it will be exclusively oriented around single-ply membranes for commercial construction.
The plant will employ about 100, said JM spokeswoman Robin Wiesner.
JM already sells TPO roofing materials, but they are currently made by a third party.
JM also manufactures roofing materials from ethylene propylene diene monomer, atactic polypropylene and styrene butadiene styrene, she said.
Mich.-based X-Rite purchases Pantone
GRAND RAPIDS, MICH. - X-Rite Inc., a Grand Rapids-based maker of color measuring and matching instrumentation and software, has bought Carlstadt, N.J.-based Pantone Inc., whose Pantone Matching System is used widely for identifying and matching colors.
The $180 million deal is scheduled to close this fall.
Pantone, which last year reported a profit of $42 million on sales of $155.5 million, sells its products directly as well as through ``hundreds of licensees in over 100 countries in the graphic arts, fashion, home, interior, plastics architectural, paint, industrial design and consumer markets,'' according to an Aug. 23 news release from X-Rite.
``This iconic brand is the perfect complement to X-Rite's business, bringing Pantone's expertise and market position in color communication and standards to our color solutions product offerings,'' said Tom Vacchiano, X-Rite's chief executive officer.
At Pantone, CEO Larry Herbert said the companies have enjoyed a partnership in color management for the digital imaging market during the past two years.
Following the deal's completion, Pantone will become a new business unit within X-Rite, with its key managers continuing to play key roles in the organization.
Stratasys Inc. triples size of HQ facility
EDEN PRAIRIE, MINN. - Stratasys Inc. more than tripled the size of its headquarters, opening an 86,000-square-foot facility at its Eden Prairie complex.
``Our new headquarters provides us the appropriate amount of space to continue our growth as we further solidify our position as a long-term global leader in [three-dimensional] printing, rapid prototyping and direct digital manufacturing,'' said Scott Crump, chief executive officer, in a news release.
The new headquarters will be used for sales, marketing, product development and research and development. Two other nearby buildings will house the company's RedEye RPM and manufacturing operations. Overall, Stratasys occupies 183,610 square feet of space at the site.
The firm is moving out of its former headquarters, a nearby 27,800-square-foot building.
Stratasys surpassed the $100 million mark in annual sales in 2006. According to the ``Wohlers Report 2007,'' it supplied 41 percent of all office-based rapid prototyping and manufacturing systems installed worldwide in 2006. It was the unit market leader for the fifth year in a row.