The Brandt Group of Companies announced Friday that it’s purchasing the former Mitsubishi Hitachi Power Systems Canada Ltd. plant in Saskatoon.
The 208,000 square-foot manufacturing facility closed in October 2016 with a workforce of almost 400 people at its height.
Brandt officials said the Saskatoon facility is similar in size to its location in Regina and hundreds of jobs could be created at the site.
“In Regina, we have about 500 people that work in those factories. This plant, fully utilized, should be in that four- to five-hundred range,” Brandt president Shaun Semple said.
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Brandt has entered into a binding agreement with Prestige Equipment and Hilco Global for the facility. The 22-acre parcel in the Hudson Bay Industrial area, the facility and all of its equipment will make the transition to local ownership for an undisclosed sum.
According to officials, Hitachi features the largest machining and fabrication equipment in the country and has produced power-generation equipment for customers around the world.
“When we learned that the Hitachi assets were going be broken up and sold off in spring, we had to act fast or the province would lose a world-class facility and the ability to produce large-scale green energy products,” Semple said.
“It is our plan to reintroduce green energy technologies such as wind turbines to assist SaskPower with its mandate to diversify beyond traditional fossil fuels.”
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The deal is expected to close April 10, with operations starting up in the coming weeks.
With Brandt already constructing an engineering facility in Regina, the acquisition will bring the company’s manufacturing footprint in Saskatchewan to over 500,000 square feet.
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