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Teutech gets a million in growing dollars

Company expanding to meet increase demand

Conditions are right for a $10 million expansion project at Guelph-based automotive parts maker Teutech Industries. The Province of Ontario is kicking in $1 million.

Guelph MPP and Ontario Minister of Education Liz Sandals made the announcement Friday morning at the company’s Speedvale Avenue facility. The provincial money will come from the Southwestern Ontario Development Fund, a fund Sandals said is modelled on the successful Eastern Ontario Development Fund.

Tony Steer started Teutech in around 1979 in a garage with a staff of three. The manufacturer of advanced drive-train parts now consists of five large-scale manufacturing facilities, two in Guelph and three in Pennsylvania south of the border.

The company employs 210 workers, and will add 50 with the expansion, which is expected to be completed by 2020.

“They’ve enabled us to continue our growth curve,” Steer said, speaking of the provincial funding.

He said the company is expanding its current product base primarily in the 361 Speedvale Ave. facility, adding additional CNC machines, induction heat-treating equipment and more, in order to progress into new platforms.

“We were fortunate enough to be involved in the very early stages of several projects that are now becoming more common place in the market, and spreading to more OEMs (original equipment manufacturers),” he added. “This provides us with a very nice growth opportunity.”

A new drive-train system that Teutech manufacturers has proven itself in fuel economy and performance, he added. The technology is spreading to more vehicles and platforms, and more end customers.

“It’s taken a number of years for it to be accepted, proven, and developed,” he said.

He added an Ontario manufacturer can only compete with low-cost, off-shore makers by being much more efficient in terms of productivity, and by ensuring higher quality products.

Steer said during Friday’s announcement that over 90 per cent of the company’s business is in exports. The current currency exchange rate is favourable for exporters.

Speaking on behalf of Brad Duguid, Minister of Economic Development, Employment and Infrastructure, Sandals said the automotive sector in Ontario is huge, contributing $15.5 billion to Ontario’s economy last year.

“A lot of our manufacturers in the sector are quite innovative, and are keeping up with the most up to date techniques in terms of manufacturing, which is what we want to encourage,” she said. “Ontario is never going to win on low-cost wages, so we have to win on high productivity and high quality.”

Teutech under Steers leadership, she said, operates in that way, producing better quality, and more innovative products with better technology.

Sandals said the two development funds have invested $1.9 billion into Ontario’s economic, creating or retaining 42,000 jobs in various manufacturing plants and businesses. The funds cover up to 15 per cent of eligible project costs.

Since late-2012, Ontario has committed to invest about $95 million through the Southwestern Ontario Development Fund, leveraging $1.1 billion in private sector investment.

“Making sure we support the regional economies is a very important part of this,” Sandal added.

 


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Rob O'Flanagan

About the Author: Rob O'Flanagan

Rob O’Flanagan has been a newspaper reporter, photojournalist and columnist for over twenty years. He has won numerous Ontario Newspaper Awards and a National Newspaper Award.
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