It's just business: Manufacturing moves from Caracol, Abbvie, WaterFurnace, and more

Manufacturing is a dynamic industry, contributing trillions of dollars to the economy every year. The size of the manufacturing industry relative to the size of many of its contingent companies can make it difficult to keep up with news developments in the every-shifting field. To help keep track, here’s a digest of five recent easily-missed manufacturing acquisitions and expansions.

Expansion: Axium Packaging celebrated the opening of its new Brampton, Ontario plant on September 23, the company’s third in the Canadian region. The new factory, according to a company statement, will allow Axium to deliver packaging faster to customers in the area and features 45 packaging equipment lines for various types of plastic packaging. In a company statement, Axium President Paul Judge said the company is “excited” to invest in Brampton.

Expansion: WaterFurnace International held a grand opening of its renovated Fort Wayne, Indiana headquarters September 29. The company, a manufacturer of geothermal and water source heat pumps, said in a statement the site’s newly-tripled 173,000-square-foot footprint will add room for new production to keep up with demand for heat pumps. Consistent with the company’s product, the expansion, like the rest of the building, uses geothermal systems for heating and cooling.

Acquisition: Caracol has acquired Hans Weber’s additive manufacturing assets for an undisclosed amount. An Italian company that builds industrial-scale 3D printers, Caracol said in a statement that the addition of Weber’s patents, machine configurations, extrusion systems, and other IP assets would expand its product portfolio for large-scale additive-manufacturing. The company also stated that Weber would benefit from exposure to Caracol’s existing network of clients.

“This agreement brings together heritage and innovation, uniting two companies with shared values of engineering excellence and customer-centricity, said Francesco De Stefano, CEO of Caracol. Ludwig and Dr. Markus Weber of the other company said in a statement that they “chose Caracol because they are the leading player in large-format [additive manufacturing].” The two companies will remain separate entities.

Expansion: Abbvie announced September 29 it had broken ground on a new $195 million manufacturing plant in North Chicago, Illinois, for making active pharmaceutical ingredients.  According to a company statement, the completed plant will allow Abbvie to reshore development of certain medicines to the United States from Europe and Asia. The new plant is part of an ongoing plan by the company to invest $10 billion in new U.S. locations. “Today’s groundbreaking is an important milestone in AbbVie’s ongoing campaign to accelerate biopharmaceutical innovation and manufacturing capabilities in the U.S.,” said Azita Saleki-Gerhardt, Abbvie’s COO.

Acquisition: Resonetics, a medical device manufacturing company, announced September 29 it had acquired Eden Holdings, an injection molder and micro-machining company. According to Resonetics CEO Kevin Kelly, the purchase will complement his company’s existing abilities in metal processing with Eden’s expertise in tooling and plastics. Eden President David Tomic said that joining Resonetics would give his companies access to a greater platform of customers.