HydraForce, international manufacturer of electrohydraulic controls, has moved into the brand new 120,000 sqft facility in the Advanced Manufacturing Hub at Aston Hall Road, Birmingham.
HydraForce’s substantial investment in the new premises comes just a year after announcing its intention to grow after securing £1.8m from the Government’s Regional Growth Fund.
The new facility adds an additional 75,000 sqft of manufacturing space, providing the company with enhanced capacity to build electrohydraulic cartridge valves and other products for the European market.
UK managing director, Peter MacDonald commented: “Our move is right on schedule with no interruption in production.
“We’d like to thank the Buckingham Group Contracting Ltd. for their efforts to complete construction of our new building so that we could take occupancy in August as planned. We are very pleased with our new place and look forward to showing it off to our customers and the community in September.”
The three-story building has production and testing areas on the ground floor, engineering and sales offices and training areas on the first and second floors. There is also a new 5,000 sqft application engineering lab.
HydraForce – which celebrated 27 years in Birmingham last year – is the first tenant of Birmingham’s Advanced Manufacturing Hub at Aston Hall Road, one of six economic zones identified by the City Council to drive Birmingham’s future growth ambitions.
The privately-owned company operates a total of five manufacturing facilities, including the new facility in Birmingham, its corporate headquarters, innovation centre, and precision machining centre in North America and a manifold assembly plant in Asia.
The previous HydraForce facility at St. Stephens Street in Birmingham will be sold.
Vice president of sales and marketing worldwide, Tony Casale added: “Our new building at the Advanced Manufacturing Hub builds on the success of our last expansion – the Innovation and Technology Center in Chicago, which opened in 2013.
“Our facility in Birmingham will improve speed to market throughout Europe. This is important to our growth in the region as more than 80% of the product we build in Birmingham is exported.”
The company’s expansion also means an increase in job opportunities, with the Birmingham workforce expeted to increase from 280 to 500 people by 2018.
MacDonald added: “Attracting the right people with the right skills at the right time is an on-going challenge, but we have a well-established apprenticeship programme and strong links with higher education. Being located in the Advanced Manufacturing Hub can help our recruitment strategy.”
