Fast-growing plastics firm Westfall Technik Inc. picked up another company, announcing Oct. 19 that it bought mold maker Extreme Tool & Engineering Inc. in Michigan.
Westfall said the purchase of Extreme, which has both mold making and injection molding facilities in Wakefield, Mich., helps it broaden its geographic footprint and add capabilities aimed at the medical and disposables markets. Terms were not disclosed.
Chandler, Ariz.-based Westfall said buying Extreme from founder and owner Mike Zacharias gives it additional capabilities in building ultra-high tolerance molds for complex medical devices and packaging and dispensing applications.
“Extreme, in combination with our prototyping businesses and molding operations, allows us to offer our customers the ability to design, engineer, and manufacture their most complex medical devices.” said Jim Berklas, Westfall's head of mergers and acquisitions, in a statement. “We continue to be on the lookout for injection molding businesses with strategically important characteristics such as Extreme.”
Westfall Managing Director Rick Shaffer told Plastics News the company likes Extreme's capabilities in building class 101 and “class 101 plus” molds, as well as automation like six-axis re-deployable robots and expertise in process development and mold qualification.
“Not necessarily everyone would be able to do that,” Shaffer said.
Zacharias said he first met Berklas at the NPE show in Orlando this year. Zacharias was at the show to pitch his company's expanding platform of plastics molding, and not to sell the company.
“I wasn't planning on selling the company there,” Zacharias said. “I was planning on selling what we do. But opportunity knocks.”
Extreme had $14.1 million in tooling sales in its most recent fiscal year, according to the Plastics News ranking of mold makers, published in early October. That was up from $11 million the previous year. It has 60 employees in mold making.
The Westfall acquisition gives Extreme resources for more growth, said Zacharias, who will continue to lead Extreme.
“What they've done is given us the opportunity to grow beyond that,” he said.
Zacharias said Extreme's history in providing molds to injection molding giant Nypro Inc. was a factor in this deal happening. Westfall founder Brian Jones is a former Nypro CEO.
“Brian Jones believes in what we've done,” Zacharias said. “He made a good case for us being a good fit in their organization.”
Westfall's purchase may spell changes for a joint venture that Extreme announced earlier this year, the Plastics Technology Alliance, with Mold Craft Inc. and Westminster Tool Inc.
“Westfall has given us the opportunity to either stay in or not,” Zacharias said, adding that if they choose to stay in, they may need to re-form the joint venture.
Westfall, which formed in late 2017, has focused on rollups of plastics firms in the tooling, medical, packaging and consumer products markets in its short history.
Including Extreme, the company has bought 10 plastics firms since then, with 11 manufacturing locations. Shaffer said it has a combined 750,000 square feet of manufacturing space, 280 injection molding machines and 1,200 employees in its companies.
