GYRB, Canadian leader in the design, manufacture and adaptation of attachment equipment for heavy machinery, announced today it has acquired 100 percent of Winkle Industries and its subsidiaries Proen Engineering Solutions and LiftTech Field Services. Based in Alliance, Ohio, Winkle is a diversified supplier of engineered mechanical and magnetic material handling solutions and contract manufacturing services.
In addition to gaining a U.S. presence, the move helps establish GRYB as an industry frontrunner with an unmatched materials handling product offering.
“Having a U.S. presence is integral to our strategic growth plan,” said Remi Beaudoin, GRYB CEO. “After much careful research, we chose Winkle because they are the best at what they do. They are known for their leadership in the industry, their deep expertise, their reputation for safety and quality, and well-established distribution network. Because we share a passion for excellence, innovation and growth, we are more formidable together.”
This is GRYB’s second acquisition in less than a year. Earlier in 2019, it acquired Ontario-based Bateman Manufacturing, which specializes in the creation and manufacture of grapples and handling attachments for many sectors. Bringing together these attachments for heavy machinery brings many synergies to the mobile cranes industry as well as excavators, construction, demolition, scrap processing, ports, mining and more.
“We are pleased to join the GRYB family and excited to bring our customers additional solutions and capabilities,” said Mark Volansky, Winkle’s director of sales. “Many of our customers, both upstream and downstream facilities that support the steel industry, also require GRYB’s products; now we can offer them top quality OEM products at a competitive price.”
In addition to synergistic products, Winkle brings GRYB a significant U.S. market share and strategic location. With combined expertise and unrivaled product offering, the group anticipates increased sales fairly quickly. The acquisition brings GRYB an additional 80,000 square feet of production space as well as a 50,000 square feet warehouse in the U.S., giving it the capacity to handle anticipated growth.
Going forward, Proen will use its engineering expertise to develop new products for GRYB companies while maintaining an external service. LiftTech will provide highly responsive field service resources to delivery onsite support for increasing uptime and optimizing product performance for GRYB, Bateman and Winkle supplied products. Also, this acquisition follows on the heels of a $6.25 million investment to increase production capacity at GRYB’s plant in Victoriaville, Quebec.
“We didn’t just buy a brand, we bought expertise,” added Beaudoin. “We’re looking forward to our public debut at the Associated Equipment Distributors trade show in Chicago next week, a key market for us.”
About the Author
Michael Roth
Editor
Michael Roth has covered the equipment rental industry full time for RER since 1989 and has served as the magazine’s editor in chief since 1994. He has nearly 30 years experience as a professional journalist. Roth has visited hundreds of rental centers and industry manufacturers, written hundreds of feature stories for RER and thousands of news stories for the magazine and its electronic newsletter RER Reports. Roth has interviewed leading executives for most of the industry’s largest rental companies and manufacturers as well as hundreds of smaller independent companies. He has visited with and reported on rental companies and manufacturers in Europe, Central America and Asia as well as Mexico, Canada and the United States. Roth was co-founder of RER Reports, the industry’s first weekly newsletter, which began as a fax newsletter in 1996, and later became an online newsletter. Roth has spoken at conventions sponsored by the American Rental Association, Associated Equipment Distributors, California Rental Association and other industry events and has spoken before industry groups in several countries. He lives and works in Los Angeles when he’s not traveling to cover industry events.