Engineering group completes latest acquisition in swoop for Sharpe Tooling

Belgrave & Powell, a specialist engineering services group, has acquired 100% of the shares of Sharpe Tooling, based in Birmingham, for an undisclosed sum.

The new acquisition will form part of Belgrave & Powell’s Machine Technology Group (MTG) which comprises some of the leading UK specialists in high quality machine tool products, robotics, fabrication and automation covering a wide variety of applications for rail, aerospace, food, pharma, gas turbine, oil & gas, energy and automotive sectors.

Belgrave & Powell is a specialist engineering services group with activities including specialist machine tool services, robotics, automation, tooling manufacture and distribution operating from facilities in Rochdale, Preston, Plymouth and Tamworth.

Businesses in the group include Weld UK, Dean Smith & Grace Lathes, GAC Rail, Autotech Robotics, Addison Forming Technologies, Techni-grind and Maydown International.

The new Sharpe Tooling acquisition follows the retirement and planned closure of the Birmingham site by the founder, Stewart Sharpe.

Founded in 1988 by Stewart, Sharpe Tooling has built up a high quality customer base for bend die tooling which, post-acquisition, fully complement Belgrave & Powell’s subsidiary business, Addison Forming Technologies.

Terms of the deal have not been disclosed, however, following completion, the entire business has been relocated successfully to MTG’s Preston facility with the creation of an additional six jobs in high precision tool making and further investment by the group in capital equipment.

The acquisition represents the fifth SME deal by Belgrave and Powell within 18 months, whose focus is UK-based specialist engineering services with activities including machine tool services, fabrication, tooling manufacture and distribution.