Skip to main content
Sister Publication Links
  • Sustainable Plastics
  • Plastics News China
  • Rubber & Plastics News
logo-pn-color
Subscribe
  • Login
  • Register
  • Subscribe
  • News
    • Processor News
    • Suppliers
    • More News
    • End Markets
    • FYI Charts
    • LSR World
    • Multimedia
    • NPE2021
    • K Show
    • Special Reports
    • Top materials of injection molders
      Recycled PET use by product category
      US PET, flexible packaging desintations
      Global fluropolymers additives market: CAGR
    • NPE exhibitors question handling of deposits for canceled trade show
      Exhibitors back NPE cancellation: ‘We couldn't take that risk'
      NPE2021 canceled as in-person event
      NPE reviews its options as pandemic prompts exhibitor to exit
    • Injection Molding
    • Blow Molding
    • Film & Sheet
    • Pipe/Profile/Tubing
    • Rotomolding
    • Thermoforming
    • Recycling
    • Machinery
    • Materials
    • Molds/Tooling
    • Product news
    • Design
    • What Keeps You Up At Night
    • Mergers & Acquisitions
    • Sustainability
    • Public Policy
    • Material Insights Videos
    • Numbers that Matter
    • Polymer Points Live
    • Automotive
    • Packaging
    • Medical
    • Consumer Products
    • Construction
    • Videos
    • Galleries
    • Podcasts
    • CEO Issue
    • Best Places to Work
    • Processor of the Year
    • Rising Stars
    • Women Breaking the Mold
  • Opinion
    • The Plastics Blog
    • Kickstart
    • Heavy Metal
    • One Good Resin
    • BRICS and Plastics
    • All Things Data
    • Viewpoint
    • Perspective
    • Mailbag
    • Getting back on the road
      How long will it take for EVs to replace internal combustion engines?
      Watching, and hoping, for progress in 2021
      COVID-19 stories dominate 2020 headlines
    • Kickstart: Microchips, masks and US manufacturing
      Kickstart: Bringing plastics, sustainability to the construction site
      Kickstart: Making more US beds
      Kickstart: Katherine Johnson, Perseverance, plastics and space
    • Heavy Metal: Coronavirus edition, plus the work of working from home
      Don't put off succession planning
      What's a good gift for your cobot? Batteries?
      Here's some big ideas to mull over the holidays
    • Green feet: Braskem partners with Dansko on bio-based clogs
      Curbell donates plastic sheet for prosthetics project in Ecuador
      Covestro volunteers build ramp for Ohio veteran
      Chase expands giving campaign in 2020
    • There was no choice but canceling NPE still a big deal
      The business case for producer responsibility
      Think divided government stalls plastics legislation? Think again
      ACC, NAM eye economic priorities in Biden presidency
    • Thermoformers: Would you believe a 12 percent gain?
      Just how big is thermoforming in North America?
      Changing names for compounders embracing corporate branding
      Diversity the key to outperforming the market
    • Thermoformers: Would you believe a 12 percent gain?
      The benefits of getting social
      Rising Stars shine bright future on industry
      Getting back on the road
    • Perspective: Plastics manufacturers — a surprising contribution to sustainability
      Plastics industry business owners: Listen to your future workforce
      Perspective: ‘Fake news' of a different sort?
      Perspective: Making products in the USA is good for the planet
    • Mailbag: Additional fees for electric vehicles ‘unfortunate'
      Mailbag: Where's the plastics industry's response to critics?
      Mailbag: Manufacturers struggling to follow COVID-19 safety rules
      Modernizing recycling infrastructure will benefit businesses as well as the environment
  • Shop Floor
    • Blending
    • Compounding
    • Drying
    • Injection Molding
    • Purging
    • Robotics
    • Size Reduction
    • Structural Foam
    • Tooling
    • Training
    • Maintenance can ensure efficient blender operation
      Dosing: Perfect for adding color
      Blending vs dosing: What you need to know
      Going low or high: Comparing volume
    • Colors and custom compounds
      In the laboratory: Compounding solutions
      Recycling content: Resins going ‘green’
      Compounding: Glass and other fillers
    • Dryer maintenance: Don’t err with air
      Dryers: Options for a shop’s process
      Dryer installation: Going central?
      Resins: Hygroscopic or non-hygroscopic
    • Electric injection molding presses: Efficiency is key
      Hydraulic injection molding machines
      Proper maintenance can prevent downtime
      Hybrid injection molding machines
    • Purging Hot runners: Open or closed methods
      Purging extrusion machinery
      Purging extrusion blow molding machines
      Purging: Chemical, abrasive and non-abrasive
    • Controls, special applications boost production, profitability
      Robot maintenance key for smooth operation
      High-speed robots: A rapid way to increase efficiency
      Robots: Every shape and size
    • Maintenance: Key for efficiency
      Shredders: Plastic in pieces
      Safety first for size reduction
      Granulators: The right fit
    • Video: Structural foam molding
      Structural foam molding: Flexibility for processors
    • Mold inventory: How many molds does a shop have?
      Molds: Innovation
      Mold changeover: Saving time and money
      How molds work
    • Labor: Apprenticeships may provide answer
      Internships: Solving the skills gap in-house
      College training, programs
      Lean Six Sigma: Transforming business operation
  • Events
    • Plastics News Events
    • Industry Events
    • Livestreams/Webinars
    • Ask the Expert
    • Polymer Points Live
    • Reifenhäuser Technologies Livestreams
    • 2020 Caps & Closures Library
    • Plastics in Healthcare Library
    • Women Breaking the Mold Networking Forum Library
    • Polymer Points Live - February 2021
      Polymer Points Live - January 2021
      Polymer Points Live - December 2020
      Polymer Points Live - October 2020
    • Plastics in Healthcare 2020
    • Plastics News Executive Forum
    • Plastics in Automotive
    • Plastics News Caps & Closures
    • Plastics in Healthcare
    • Women Breaking the Mold Networking Forum
  • Resin Prices
    • All Resins
    • Commodity TPs
    • High Temp TPs
    • ETPs
    • Thermosets
    • Recycled Plastics
    • Historic Commodity Thermoplastics
    • Historic High Temp Thermoplastics
    • Historic Engineering Thermoplastics
    • Historic Thermosets
    • Historic Recycled Plastics
  • Rankings
    • Injection Molders
    • Blow Molders
    • Film Sheet
    • Thermoformers
    • Pipe Profile Tubing
    • Rotomolders
    • Mold/Toolmakers
    • LSR Processors
    • Recyclers
    • Compounders - List
    • Association - List
    • Plastic Lumber - List
    • All
  • Data Store
  • Directory
  • More+
    • Classifieds
    • Digital Edition
    • Newsletters
    • Sponsored Content
    • White Papers
    • Processor of the Year submissions
    • Sponsored By Mitsubishi
      Innovative new technology from Mitsubishi Engineering-Plastics Corporation helps reduce emission footprints
      Canon Virginia, Inc.
      Sponsored Content By Canon Virginia, Inc.
      Canon Virginia Inc. brings collaboration to the table
      Sponsored By CDS MACHINES
      Facing medical equipment shortages during COVID-19 outbreak?
      Sponsored Content By Canon Virginia, Inc.
      Transform your molding capabilities with the Canon Shuttle Mold System
    • Sponsored By Conexiom
      Use Sales Order Automation to free up time for CSRs to focus on customers, not manual entry
    • Place an Ad
    • Sign up for Early Classified
MENU
Breadcrumb
  1. Home
  2. News
January 25, 2021 11:51 AM

Auxo, Orchard Creek set the pace for M&A in late 2020

Frank Esposito
Plastics News Staff
  • Tweet
  • Share
  • Share
  • Email
  • More
    Print
    Orchard Creek Capital

    Jon Carlson, president of Orchard Creek Capital.

    Michigan-based investment firms Auxo Investment Partners and Orchard Creek Capital LLC completed a total of five plastics M&A deals in the second half of 2020.

    Auxo of Grand Rapids purchased Fort Wayne, Ind.-based Paramount Tube Engineered Solutions, Cleveland-based Euclid Medical and GC Dies LLC of Elmhurst, Ill.

    Paramount Tube and Euclid Medical both operate under the brand Precision Products Group Inc. PPG CEO Dave Hooe will continue in that role.

    Paramount Tube makes small-diameter, spiral-wound and extruded tubular products for electric motors and other uses. Euclid Medical designs, engineers and manufactures automated single- and multi-dose pharmaceutical packing systems.

    GC Dies has 50 employees in a 37,500-square-foot factory in Elmhurst. The company makes flat corrugated, rotary corrugated and flat steel rule dies used by converters.

    Orchard Creek of Northville bought injection molder Tool Technology Corp. in Inman, S.C., and thermoformer Advantage Plastics of New York Inc. in Winter Haven, Fla. MBS Advisors of Florence, Mass., advised Tool Technology in that transaction. Orchard Creek already owned injection molder Classic Die Inc. of Grand Rapids, which it acquired in 2018.

    Orchard Creek is headed by President Jon Carlson, who has a background in financial management in manufacturing, including 10 years at Ford Motor Co. While at Ford, Carlson worked in the components group, which eventually was spun off as Visteon Corp.

    Chris Sweeney, Rubber & Plastics News.

    From left: Anthony Fleszar, sales manager for North America, and Brenan Riehl, CEO and president of GW Plastics, at the firm's MD&&M West booth in Anaheim, Calif.

    "We believe that the plastics industry has a number of attractive elements," he said. "The industry has been steadily growing over many years, as the technology supporting plastics provides an expanding set of technical capabilities."

    Orchard Creek is pursuing investments in smaller businesses, with annual sales ranging from $4 million to $20 million, and Carlson said he will have a "longer investment horizon" than other private equity firms. He said Orchard Creek wants to buy "well-established plastics companies with a defensible market position and a proven track record."

    In another major second-half deal, Chicago-based private equity firm Madison Dearborn Partners LLC acquired IPL Plastics Inc., a major injection molder of pails and other rigid packaging, in a $555 million stock transaction.

    IPL is based in Montreal and has been publicly traded on Toronto's stock exchange since 2018. But the shares have underperformed since the IPO. Madison Dearborn agreed to pay C$10 per share for the company. That's 26 percent less than the C$13.50 that shareholders paid for the company when it filed the IPO.

    The second half also saw a full-circle deal when investment firm Graham Partners — a former part owner of packaging giant Berry Global Group Inc. — bought Berry's flexible converting business. That deal reunited Larry Goldstein, CEO of Graham's Advanced Barrier Extrusions LLC unit, with a business he had run while at Berry.

    The deal includes six printing and laminating flexible packaging facilities that had been part of Berry's North American extrusion, converting and coating business. Graham, of Newtown Square, Pa., will combine the Berry business with ABX, its own flexible packaging unit based in Charlotte, N.C. The plants involved in the sale are in Columbus, Ga.; Homer, La.; Macedon, N.Y.; Schaumburg, Ill.; and Milwaukee and Pewaukee, Wis. Around 700 Berry employees are moving to ABX in the deal.

    Graham acquired ABX in 2018. Prior to the Berry deal, ABX operated two plants and employed about 100. The combined business will operate under the ABX name. The Berry business being acquired has annual sales of more than $200 million.

    In other notable second-half deals:

    • Torekov, Sweden-based injection molder Nolato made a big growth move for growth in the U.S. market, buying Bethel, Vt.-based GW Plastics Inc. Officials with both firms said the two companies are an excellent fit, with complementary medical and automotive molding businesses and similar corporate cultures.

    "Over the years, GW has been approached by a lot of companies. The one that resonated, even when we were not interested in selling, was Nolato," Brenan Riehl, president and CEO of GW Plastics, told Plastics News.

    The $225 million deal will give Nolato Medical Solutions, the company's medical business unit, a stronger position in North America. GW Plastics has both plastics and liquid silicone rubber medical molding operations.

    GW Plastics was the PN 2009 Processor of the Year. It posted sales of $178 million in 2019. GW also won the 2015 Sustained Excellence award, which honors continued growth and achievement and is given to a past Processor of the Year winner.

    GW was founded in 1955 by John Galvin and Odin Westgaard, who both had extensive plastics industry experience. They sold to Carborundum Co. in 1973. After a series of deals, GW passed to Standard Oil of Ohio in 1981. In 1984, a group of managers and investors led by Frederic Riehl — Brenan's father and the current GW chairman — bought the company from Sohio.

    • PPC Flexible Packaging LLC made its sixth acquisition in three years, this time buying Custom Poly Bag Inc. for an undisclosed price. PPC of Buffalo Grove, Ill., does flexographic printing and converting of flexible films, bags and pouches. Alliance, Ohio-based Custom Poly is a flexible packaging converter that serves bakery, medical and specialty consumer markets.

    PPC now operates eight plants and employs more than 1,000. Officials said that all of the acquired businesses were specialty and differentiated flexible packaging firms. The Custom Poly deal is the first for PPC since October 2019, when it acquired Popular Ink LLC of McKinney, Texas.

    • Thermoset molder and compounder Mar-Bal Inc. purchased Lattice Composites LLC, a Riverside, Calif.-based epoxy and polyester compounder. Mar-Bal will merge Lattice with its AltraSet Composite Technologies unit, and Lattice will move its advanced manufacturing equipment and staff to Mar-Bal's AltraSet plant in Chagrin Falls, Ohio.

    The deal will expand Mar-Bal's composite technologies to include Lattice's customized epoxy chemistry systems. "This is a natural evolution for us," Mar-Bal President and CEO Scott Balogh told PN. He added that aerospace customers are looking for the repeatability and scalability that Lattice's materials can provide.

    • Flexible packaging giant ProAmpac purchased a Canadian holding company that includes both plastic and paper bags and foam trays for the retail and foodservice industries. The Rosenbloom Groupe is based in Montreal and covers paper bags made under the Rosenbloom name, plastic bags, sacks and liners made by Hymopack Ltd. of Toronto and Dyne-A-Pak Inc. of Laval, Quebec, a maker of expanded polystyrene trays for fresh meats and fish.

    ProAmpac Ranks as North America's ninth-largest film and sheet maker, according to the most recent PN ranking, with estimated sales of $990 million in the region. Cincinnati-based ProAmpac is owned by Pritzker Private Capital. ProAmpac officials said the acquisition boosts its business through greater reach into Canada and more offerings for retailers and foodservice customers.

    • Westlake, Ohio-based Nordson Corp. sold the screws and barrels product line in its polymer processing systems division to Chicago-based private equity firm Altair Investments Inc.

    The product line, which includes the Xaloy brand, generates more than $70 million in annual sales and employs 200. Started in 1929, the Xaloy brand pioneered the use of bimetallic materials to improve the performance of a wide range of plastic processing equipment for both molders and original equipment manufacturers.

    The product line consists of Xaloy manufacturing facilities in Austintown, Ohio, and Chonburi, Thailand. Both facilities are being acquired as well as the equipment, patents and intellectual property. About half of its customers are plastics processors and half are machinery OEMs, such as KraussMaffei, Davis-Standard and Milacron.

    • In a unique deal, the fruitcake market played a role in Wisconsin-based packaging thermoformer Portage Plastics Corp. expanding into the Sunshine State, by acquiring Plant City, Fla.-based Paradise Plastics.

    PPC already has plants in Portage, Wis., and Brownsville, Texas. The deal is, in part, the result in declining interest in making homemade holiday fruitcakes.

    Paradise Plastics was formerly the thermoforming and injection molding unit of Paradise Inc., a publicly traded fruit company that is in the process of liquidating. The company sold its candied fruit operation to Marion, N.Y.-based Seneca Foods Corp. in July 2019.

    Paradise Inc. specialized in making syrup-infused fruit for fruitcakes. The company once produced 85 percent of the candied fruit consumed in the United States, according to a Tampa Bay Times report, with the majority sold in supermarkets.

    Letter
    to the
    Editor

    Do you have an opinion about this story? Do you have some thoughts you'd like to share with our readers? Plastics News would love to hear from you. Email your letter to Editor at [email protected]

    Get our newsletters

    Staying current is easy with Plastics News delivered straight to your inbox, free of charge.

    Subscribe today

    Subscribe to Plastics News

    Subscribe now
    Connect with Us
    • LinkedIn
    • Facebook
    • Twitter
    • Instagram

    Plastics News covers the business of the global plastics industry. We report news, gather data and deliver timely information that provides our readers with a competitive advantage.

    logo-pn-color
    Contact Us

    1155 Gratiot Avenue
    Detroit MI 48207-2997

    Customer Service:
    877-320-1723

    Resources
    • About
    • Staff
    • Editorial Calendar
    • Media Kit
    • Data Store
    • Digital Edition
    • Custom Content
    • People
    • Contact
    • Careers
    • Sitemap
    Related Crain Publications
    • Sustainable Plastics
    • Rubber & Plastics News
    • Urethanes Technology
    • Plastics News China
    • European Rubber Journal
    • Tire Business
    Legal
    • Terms and Conditions
    • Privacy Policy
    • Privacy Request
    Copyright © 1996-2021. Crain Communications, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
    • News
      • Processor News
        • Injection Molding
        • Blow Molding
        • Film & Sheet
        • Pipe/Profile/Tubing
        • Rotomolding
        • Thermoforming
        • Recycling
      • Suppliers
        • Machinery
        • Materials
        • Molds/Tooling
        • Product news
        • Design
      • More News
        • What Keeps You Up At Night
        • Mergers & Acquisitions
        • Sustainability
        • Public Policy
        • Material Insights Videos
        • Numbers that Matter
        • Polymer Points Live
      • End Markets
        • Automotive
        • Packaging
        • Medical
        • Consumer Products
        • Construction
      • FYI Charts
        • Current FYI
      • LSR World
      • Multimedia
        • Videos
        • Galleries
        • Podcasts
      • NPE2021
      • K Show
      • Special Reports
        • CEO Issue
        • Best Places to Work
        • Processor of the Year
        • Rising Stars
        • Women Breaking the Mold
    • Opinion
      • The Plastics Blog
      • Kickstart
      • Heavy Metal
      • One Good Resin
      • BRICS and Plastics
      • All Things Data
      • Viewpoint
      • Perspective
      • Mailbag
    • Shop Floor
      • Blending
      • Compounding
      • Drying
      • Injection Molding
      • Purging
      • Robotics
      • Size Reduction
      • Structural Foam
      • Tooling
      • Training
    • Events
      • Plastics News Events
        • Plastics News Executive Forum
        • Plastics in Automotive
        • Plastics News Caps & Closures
        • Plastics in Healthcare
        • Women Breaking the Mold Networking Forum
      • Industry Events
      • Livestreams/Webinars
      • Ask the Expert
      • Polymer Points Live
      • Reifenhäuser Technologies Livestreams
      • 2020 Caps & Closures Library
      • Plastics in Healthcare Library
      • Women Breaking the Mold Networking Forum Library
    • Resin Prices
      • All Resins
      • Commodity TPs
        • Historic Commodity Thermoplastics
      • High Temp TPs
        • Historic High Temp Thermoplastics
      • ETPs
        • Historic Engineering Thermoplastics
      • Thermosets
        • Historic Thermosets
      • Recycled Plastics
        • Historic Recycled Plastics
    • Rankings
      • Injection Molders
      • Blow Molders
      • Film Sheet
      • Thermoformers
      • Pipe Profile Tubing
      • Rotomolders
      • Mold/Toolmakers
      • LSR Processors
      • Recyclers
      • Compounders - List
      • Association - List
      • Plastic Lumber - List
      • All
    • Data Store
    • Directory
    • More+
      • Classifieds
        • Place an Ad
        • Sign up for Early Classified
      • Digital Edition
      • Newsletters
      • Sponsored Content
        • ENGEL Sponsored Content
      • White Papers
      • Processor of the Year submissions