Spanbild buys Mike Greer Homes in Concision factory pship

By Paul McBeth

April 19 (BusinessDesk) - Christchurch-based building company Spanbild has bought out Concision Panelised Technology partner Mike Greer Homes (MGH), giving it control of a building panelisation factory in Rolleston.

Spanbild, whose suite of brands include Versatile Homes & Buildings, Ideal Buildings and Totalspan Steel Buildings, today said it acquired MGHs' 50 percent stake in New Zealand Panelised Building Systems, trading as Concision, for an undisclosed sum. The building firm will integrate Concision into its existing manufacturing base across five sites in New Zealand and Australia, while MGH will investigate setting up its own manufacturing in Auckland and in the North Island where it's seeking to grow.

"To ensure we best meet customer expectations, we have merged Spanbild Projects, our existing commercial building solutions company, into Concision, to seamlessly integrate the substantial design and technology IP and delivery capability of these two companies," chair Don Elder said in a statement. "With ongoing development and investment under Spanbild, Concision will continue to expand its product range and capacity, to meet the strongly growing market demand for pre-site manufacturing across a wide range of building markets."

No price was disclosed. Spanbild provides up to 5,000 finished buildings a year from its existing production base, while Concision has supported the rapid construction of 500 houses, multi-unit dwellings, schools and other commercial buildings since it was set up in 2015.

"Everyone agrees the need for high quality, fast, off-site manufacturing to meet an ever-widening gap that can’t be addressed by conventional construction," Elder said.

Spanbild takes over the factory this week, adding another 48 staff to its workforce.

Concision's panelised factory was the country's first and was opened by former Prime Minister John Key and then-Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee as the previous administration sought out new avenues to accelerate construction times in response to the devastation wreaked on Christchurch. At the time, it was envisaged the factory's employment would rise to 75 and support the construction of 1,000 houses a year.

Spanbild is a member of industry body PrefabNZ, which lobbies for greater use of prefabricated buildings, which it wants to see accounting for 40 percent of construction by cost by 2020. In 2010, that rate was 17 percent.

(BusinessDesk)

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