Hanson complete acquisition of Material Service
HANSON plc have completed the acquisition of Material Service Corp. from General Dynamics for $300 million (£160 million) in cash. The acquisition is expected to be earnings enhancing for Hanson in the first full year of ownership and will be financed from existing resources.
Material Service are the thirteenth largest producers of aggregates in the US and will be managed within Hanson Aggregates North America. Employing more than 800 people in Illinois and western Indiana, the company sold over 20 million tons of aggregates in 2005 and is estimated to have approximately 1.5 billion tons of reserves.
Commenting on the acquisition, Alan Murray, chief executive of Hanson plc, said: ‘Since becoming a focused heavy building materials group in 1997, we have invested around US$2.5 billion on over 50 bolt-on acquisitions in North America. Material Service is the largest of these US dollar transactions and reinforces our position as one of the leading aggregates producers in the US.’
