ESCO® Corporation Announces Acquisition of Austcast and Newlcast

PORTLAND, Ore., Dec. 1, 2010 /PRNewswire/ -- ESCO Corporation (www.escocorp.com), a leading global provider of wear-parts and attachments for the mining and construction industries, announced today the acquisition of all of the issued and outstanding shares of Austcast Pty Ltd in Brisbane, Australia, and its subsidiary Newlcast in Dunedin, New Zealand. The acquisition of these two foundries strengthens ESCO's product offerings and expansion efforts in Australia by providing local foundry capacity.

"In recent months, ESCO Corporation has made significant investments in Australia to directly support a growing number of mining and construction customers in the region," said Cal Collins, President of Engineered Products for ESCO Corporation. "Our acquisition of Austcast is a key development in ESCO's plan to establish a national sales, supply chain, and manufacturing network in Australia, and will further our efforts to deliver quality, value and speed to our customers on a global scale."  

Austcast manufactures high-integrity steel castings for the rail, mining and industrial industries, providing a wide range of steels and specialized alloys. Doing business as ESCO, the company will continue to manufacture rail products, and will adjust its operations in 2011 to include ESCO's industry-leading Ground Engaging Tools (GET) and other mining and construction wear parts.

With the formal closing of the acquisition, ESCO also welcomes approximately 100 new Austcast and Newlcast employees to its workforce of nearly 4,700 globally.

This purchase follows ESCO's July, 2010 acquisition of Swift Group with offices and facilities in Brisbane, Mackay and Kingaroy, and according to Collins, "demonstrates ESCO's firm commitment to the Australian market and local manufacturing, contrary to other companies which are moving manufacturing out of Australia."

ESCO currently sells crusher wear-parts, bi-metallic buttons and blocks, Ultralok® tooth systems and SEBBA truck bodies in Australia.  The majority of ESCO's other products are distributed in Australia through Bradken Limited under a license agreement which will expire in June, 2011. Upon expiration of the license agreement, ESCO will directly supply the Australian market with its complete line of GET, wear-parts, buckets, and attachments – including ESCO's Profill™ dragline buckets, as well as the SV2™ and Posilok® Plustooth systems.

SOURCE ESCO Corporation