Italian plastics machinery manufacturer, Cannon (I-20090 Trezzano; www.thecannongroup.com), has sold its injection moulding machinery business, Sandretto Industrie (I-10097 Collegno / Torino; www.sandretto.it), and Windsor Kunststofftechnologie (D-63452 Hanau; www.windsor-gmbh.de), for an undisclosed sum to extrusion, injection moulding and die cast machinery manufacturer HPM (Mt Gilead, Ohio / USA). Since its 2001 insolvency, HPM has been a subsidiary of Taylor´s Industrial Services (www.taylorsind.com).

The takeover plans appear to be fairly recent, because it was only at the end of January that Sandretto and HPM signed a distribution agreement for the Italian-built machines in North America. According to Cannon´s CEO, Marco Volpato, synergies between the main urethanes business unit and the acquired injection moulding segment have not developed as well as expected, therefore the sale.

With the acquisition, HPM, known in particular for its large “Freedom” machines with a clamping force of up to 45,000 kN, has strengthened its hand in the field of smaller machines. Together with Windsor, Sandretto manufactures, among other products, the “Nove” line for the automotive industry, with clamping forces of 750-4,850 kN. One unmentioned side effect of the transaction will be the pooling of know-how in the servicing of large machines. Windsor was founded as a service company for machinery with high clamping forces.

In Sandretto, the Americans are taking over a group evidently in the throes of restructuring. In spring 2004, Sandretto, with estimated sales of EUR 130m in 2003, revealed plans to cut around 115 jobs, about a quarter of its Italian workforce. Altogether, it employs around 700. After Taylor´s takeover of HPM, nearly all the 290 employees were made redundant, but a year later the company again had over 100 employees. The last figures available indicated sales of USD 40m in 2002.