ESAB, one of the world's leading manufacturers of welding and cutting equipment and welding consumables, has completed the acquisition of Sychevsky, a Russian manufacturer of welding electrodes. The business manufactures electrodes for electric arc welding, including products for use in the nuclear industry and for welding alloy thermal steel; the company's plant has a quality management system that is certified to ISO 9001:2000.
ESAB has been operating in Russia for over a decade and has a sales company based in Moscow and a factory in St Petersburg (SVEL, acquired in 2000), which produces electrodes and agglomerated flux. With the acquisition of the Sychevsky plant, located 280km west of Moscow and with 300 employees, ESAB says it has become the largest Western European supplier of welding consumables in Russia.
In 2011 and beyond, ESAB will be investing in expanding capacity in the Russian factories, both for the current product range as well as future new products.