Bookmark 07-22-2015

Victrex Acquires Kleiss Gears

Victrex further enhances its solution provider capability following the acquisition of Kleiss Gears (figure: Victrex)

Victrex plc, Thornton Cleveleys, UK, is further enhancing its ability to provide complete ‘integrated’ solutions following its acquisition of US-based polymer gears specialist Kleiss Gears, Grantsburg, WI/USA.

New and existing customers can now benefit from integrated polymer-based gear capabilities, including design, prototyping, testing, tool design and manufacture of polymer-based gears. Kleiss Gears has a proven track record stretching over 20 years of replacing and complementing metal gear systems with high-performance engineering polymer gears such as Victrex PEEK. Victrex is now able to better support the development of high performance polymer gears for demanding applications in automotive, energy and other industries – whether a material solution or the complete integrated system solution that customers seek. Family-owned Kleiss has been and is at the forefront of gear and tool design, validation testing and manufacture of precision engineered polymer gears since 1995.

Following the acquisition, Victrex will be able to enhance its offering, including rapid development processes such as material selection, gear and tool design, testing and validation, and precision manufacturing capabilities. This will enable customers to bring robust solutions to the market faster, and subsequently pave the way to greater mutual success. “We have been partnering with Victrex for many years and are convinced that our customers and end-users will benefit from a more integrated approach, enabling them to develop and launch gears that solve their key challenges with greatly reduced development cycles,” commented Rod Kleiss, President of Kleiss Gears. “Kleiss Gears offers Victrex the opportunity to accelerate adoption of our Victrex PEEK gear proposition to meet the needs of the automotive industry and is in line with our aim to double the amount of PEEK volume in cars over the medium term", David Hummel, Chief Executive of Victrex, said.