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Oldcastle Glass acquires Antamex International

Oct. 2006 – Oldcastle Glass has acquired Antamex International, based in Toronto,
Ontario, a privately held supplier of high performance curtainwall
systems and engineering design services for commercial, institutional
and multi-storey condominium construction markets.

Oldcastle Glass has acquired Antamex International, based in Toronto, Ontario, a privately held supplier of high performance curtainwall systems and engineering design services for commercial, institutional and multi-storey condominium construction markets.

Antamex will become the cornerstone of Oldcastle Glass Envelope, a comprehensive range of architectural glass, operable windows, storefronts, doors and curtainwall products designed to close the building envelope. By narrowing the number of vendors required in building construction projects, Oldcastle Glass Envelope will allow architects, developers and glazing contractors to reduce inherent risks, minimize costs, and close the building envelope more quickly and efficiently.

“By virtue of its extensive engineering design capability, outstanding market reputation and international project portfolio, Antamex participates in commercial construction projects from their earliest stage,” says Ted Hathaway, CEO, Oldcastle Glass. “This acquisition puts Oldcastle Glass in a unique position to seamlessly integrate building envelope products and services, including architectural glass and custom engineered curtainwall. Antamex is a world class company and a superb strategic fit with our building envelope strategy.”

“Oldcastle Glass provides Antamex with significant financial resources and substantial capabilities in high performance architectural glass products and services throughout North America. This partnership will strengthen our company as we extend our geographic reach, enhance our product offerings and bring greater value to our customers,” says Elio Toffoli, Antamex’s current president and CEO, who will continue to lead the company after the acquisition.

Distributors of quality
Automated Entrances in Calgary, Alberta, has become a premiere supplier of commercial doors and related hardware in western Canada after picking up the exclusive distribution rights for three major manufacturers.

Automated Entrances is now the agent for International Door Closers. This is a pedestrian door hardware supplier that carries a full line of surface and concealed manual door closers, as well as pivots, panic hardware, deadlocks, paddle handles and flush bolts.

The company has also become the new distributors of Record-USA in Alberta and western Canada. Record is a Swiss manufacturing company that is one of the largest manufacturers of pedestrian automatic door equipment in Europe. The company has purchased Keane Monroe factory in North Carolina in the US and is now producing an advanced line of European based technology of Automatic Pedestrian Door Systems (APDS).

“The demand has been amazing because the pricing is competitive and the service is great,” says Steven Petersen, company spokesperson for Automated Entrances.

Automated Entrances has also announced that it is now a direct distributor for Hunter Automatics in Alberta. Hunter Automatics, based in Toronto, Ontario, is the only full line Canadian manufacturer of automatic sliding, automatic swinging and barrier free door operators.

“The Hunter product has proven itself over time and is now making rapid in roads to the American market. Automated Entrances will support this premier Canadian made product in Alberta,” says Petersen.

Licensed for digital decoration
ProTemp Glass has entered into a licensing agreement with DecoTherm to produce and market the DecoTherm Digital ceramic frit glass decoration technology. Based in Concord, Ontario, ProTemp will supply DecoTherm custom decorative glass to glaziers and glass shops in Ontario.

Dolores Primo, general manager of ProTemp Glass, views DecoTherm as a complement to their current decorative offering. “DecoTherm opens up new opportunities for us and our customers to expand the use of decorative glass. The digital nature of the technology takes creativity to the next level with highly detailed, multi-coloured imaging for custom and short-run production.”

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Industry appointments

Donald E. Friese (left), chairman of the board and CEO for C.R. Laurence, with Lloyd W. Talbert, the newly appointed president and COO of the company.

C.R. Laurence has appointed Lloyd W. Talbert as president and chief operating officer (COO) of the company. He most recently served as executive vice-president of CRL. Donald E. Friese will remain as chairman of the board and CEO.

“As we continually charted the course of CRL as a company, I have always been concerned about the lines of succession, in terms of leadership. I knew we needed to continually search for someone with the talent, desire and ambition to make our company successful for many years to come – a person with vision and the ability to execute that vision,” says Friese. “I found that person in Lloyd W. Talbert, who has served CRL for more than 15 years. As chairman and CEO, my role will stay the same for now. I plan to help Lloyd succeed in his new position and we will work together to continue to grow this company. He is ready, and I want to wish him the very best in his new appointment. This is an important and great day for CRL, our employees and our customers.”

Ross Christie, vice-president of sales and marketing for Walker Glass in Montreal, Quebec, has appointed Marc Deschamps as business development manager and Danik Dancause as marketing manager.

Deschamps and Dancause have been with the company since 1998 and 2002, respectively. They will both be instrumental in leading the business, marketing and product development challenges of the future.

The Prelco Group has appointed Andrew James as architectural sales consultant for Ontario in addition to representing Prelco for a select number of accounts. This is a newly created position in which James will be focussing on architects as well as further developing opportunities in the Ontario region.

As a graduate of the Canadian Institute of Management Program from the University of Western Ontario, James has nine years of experience in the glass industry, including seven years as a territory sales manager with Guardian Industries and two years of experience as an agent for several primary overseas glass manufacturers. He has extensive experience in sales and consulting with architects, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs),
glazing contractors and fabricators.

Conway	Hummel

Azon USA has added two new employees at its world headquarters in Kalamazoo, Michigan.
Joe Conway has joined Azon as business development specialist for performance products. In this role, Conway will handle the promotion and sales of Azon’s performance cast elastomer product lines. Prior to joining Azon, Conway spent more than 17 years in the thermal plastic industry, primarily in sales, marketing and product management.

Betsy Hummel has been appointed to the new position of communications specialist in the growing media department. Hummel will concentrate on the composition and execution of collateral materials, the editing of corporate documents, and the overall branding and development of the global corporate identity for Azon.

Randall

Bob Randall, a 13 year Viracon employee, has recently been named vice-president of operations. Pre-viously, Randall served five years as director of sales as well as numerous leadership positions throughout the organization.

Andersen purchases Silver Line
Silver Line Building Products Corporation, a manufacturer of vinyl windows, has been purchased by Andersen Corporation, a manufacturer of windows, patio doors and storm doors. Silver Line will operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Andersen.

“The resources that will be available to us as part of the Andersen enterprise will position us to meet our growth targets for the future,” says Kenneth Silverman, chairman and chief executive officer of Silver Line. “After running a family-owned business for 59 years, we are proud to join another organization with a similar culture and rich history of success and caring.”

“We are very excited about this opportunity to expand our business into new market segments, especially via the leading vinyl window manufacturer,” says Jim Humphrey, president and chief executive officer at Andersen.

EGP creates subsidiary for heated glass
A brand new wholly-owned subsidiary called Thermique Technologies, LLC, will take control of all heated glass projects, products and technologies from Engineered Glass Products (EGP). Thermique Technologies will concentrate on the development, sales and marketing of Thermique heated glass, allowing EGP to remain focussed on its core business of heat-reflective glass.

Thermique heated glass is a proprietary technology developed by EGP to uniformly heat a lite of glass with precise control. The technology works by safely conducting an electrical current across a specially coated lite of glass. The electrical resistance of the glass causes it to heat up uniformly across the entire surface, and a proprietary control module allows the user to adjust the glass temperature with precise control.

Thermique Technologies is developing commercial products for heated architectural windows as its technology is being incorporated into low-E window units where the interior lite of an IG unit is electrically heated.

The creation of Thermique Technologies as a separate company is designed to streamline the operations of both companies for greater efficiency and customer service. Patrick Earley, of Engineered Glass Products, has assumed the role of CEO at Thermique Technologies. Earley will be joined by Peter Gerhardinger, who led the engineering team that developed Thermique heated glass.

Extrusion shipments up
The Aluminum Extruders Council (AEC), in co-operation with the Aluminum Association has released industry estimates of extrusion shipments by major market for 2005. AEC and the Aluminum Association have been collaborating and reporting annual end-use figures jointly since 1999, resulting in a more accurate account of aluminum extrusion shipments.

Domestic consumption of aluminum extrusions in the US and Canada totalled an estimated 4.42 billion pounds in 2005, an increase of 5.7 percent over the revised previous year total of 4.18 billion pounds.

Building and construction accounted for the largest market segment with shipments of 1.83 billion pounds of aluminum extrusions, or 41 percent of the domestic market for extrusions. Shipments in this market segment for 2005 increased by 4.4 percent compared to 2004. Doors and windows continue to dominate the category with nearly 45 percent of the market segment’s total shipments, with shipments growing 3.7 percent from 2004 to 2005. Shipments of curtainwall, store fronts and entrances also increased in 2005 over the previous year. -end-

IGMA recognized as AIA/CES provider

The American Institute of Architects (AIA) has recognized the Insulating Glass Manufacturers Alliance (IGMA) as a ‘registered provider’ of educational programs for architects.

Simultaneously, IGMA is posting its first course ‘The Power of Certified and Tested Insulating Glass Units’ onto the web site of Architectural Record magazine which is easily downloadable in a PDF format.

Architects taking the course will understand the relevance of the new harmonized insulating glass (IG) standard and its importance to the architectural and specification community.

The course will enable architects to identify some of the differences between the new standard and
its predecessor and become familiar with insulating glass certification and testing programs, their impact on the longevity of these units and the overall credibility of the building envelope.

“We’ve worked on preparing this program for more than a year. It was developed together with our members and architects to assist our friends in architecture in understanding our industry products and services, thus enabling them to more easily specify this all important building envelope component,” says Margaret Webb, IGMA’s executive director.

Architects can access this course for AIA credits by going to: http://archrecord.construction.com/resources/conteduc/

For additional information, contact IGMA at: 1500 Bank Street, Suite 300, Telephone: (613) 233-1510 or visit: www.igmaonline.org -end-

When you have news of concern to the glass industry, please send it to: Chris Skalkos, Glass Canada, 145 Thames Road West, Exeter, Ontario N0M 1S3. Email: cskalkos@annexweb.com