GF Machining Solutions has held a groundbreaking ceremony to celebrate the announcement of an expansion in Canada.
Together with sister company GF Piping Systems, the companies plan to open a new joint headquarters to strengthen direct sales and service support for Canadian manufacturers.
The companies broke ground for the 67,000 sq. ft. facility located in Vaughan, Ont., north of Toronto, at the end of October. The new Canadian headquarters will feature a 4,818 sq. ft. demonstration centre along with full sales and service support staff.
Also serving as a distribution centre, the facility will streamline the sales and acquisition process for customers and help to shorten delivery times. It will also stock a wide range of consumables for EDM customers, and house a training room where up to 24 people can receive advanced training. Local application or service engineers housed in this central location will be better positioned to support customers.
“Having direct sales and support in Canada will allow GF Machining to offer competitive pricing on some of the high level manufacturing solutions offered to manufacturers, including automation solutions from System 3R and GF Machining’s advanced manufacturing lines, including 3D Systems, Laser Ablation/Texturing and Microlution,” says Sean Smith, sales manager – Canada.
From left to right: Heather Newman, operations and inside sales manager, GFPS; John Giroux, managing director, GFPS; Mark Sanhamel, director of operations, GFMS; Sean Smith, sales manager – Canada, GFMS; Philipp Hauser, president and head of market region, North and Central America, GFMS.
“Investing domestically in Canada and improving upon our local services will further enhance both GF Machining Solutions’ and GF Piping Systems’ abilities to serve the Canadian market,” said Philipp Hauser, president – head of market region, North and Central America for GF Machining Solutions. “Manufacturers in this region have come to know and understand the quality, strength and reliability of the GF brand, and this new facility will provide easy, localized access to our full range of manufacturing technologies.”
John Giroux, country manager, Georg Fischer Piping Systems Ltd., Canada, says the new GF facility will significantly benefit Canadian piping customers in terms of support and product availability.
“With the new facility, we will expand our warehouse space and inventory by 100 per cent for even more availability of and access to all GF Piping Systems products, both industrial and utility,” Giroux said at the groundbreaking. “To further support Canadian customer needs, there will also be an expanded custom fabrication area along with clean room and header capability up to 24 inch diameters.”
Completion is scheduled for March 2020.
GFMS has added key personnel to its Canadian operations in 2019 and says it plans to add additional staff in targeted areas that need to be expanded.
