Monroe Truck Equipment Acquires Towmaster
Monroe Truck Equipment acquired Towmaster Inc., a Litchfield, Minn.-based manufacturer of tag and large fifth-wheel trailers for construction and rental markets. The company also distributes and installs truck equipment for municipal and commercial fleet operators specializing in snow and ice removal.
Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. The purchase is the first for Monroe since the company received an equity investment from Industrial Opportunity Partners and was recapitalized in February 2015.
“The addition of Towmaster to our company is exciting on a number of fronts,” Monroe President Dave Quade said in a statement April 3. “Towmaster is a well-run company with an experienced and capable management team. Their trailer product line is a nice extension to our current products.”
The company’s truck equipment division also gives Monroe a larger footprint in the upper Midwest with the addition of facilities in Marshfield and DePere, Wis.; Flint, Mich.; Joliet, Ill.; and Louisville, Ky., Quade said.
Towmaster President Lennie Stulc said the relationship with Monroe will give the company access to capital, engineering resources and additional manufacturing capabilities.
Existing management will remain in place at Towmaster, Stulc noted.
Monroe is one of 11 platform investments in IOP’s portfolio, which includes Vancouver, Wash.-based KIC, a supplier of wheel-end components for medium- and heavy-duty trucks and trailers that it acquired in 2013. More recently, IOP in January added Union Corrugating Co., a manufacturer of metal roofing systems and components. In February, it acquired GT Technologies, a supplier of custom-engineered gasoline and diesel engine valve train actuation components and assemblies for automotive, truck and off-road vehicles.
Union Corrugating, based Fayetteville, N.C., operates 11 production and distribution facilities in the United States. GT Technologies, based in Westland, Mich., has manufacturing and assembly operations in Ohio and Florida and in Curtiba, Brazil.
