Crown Equipment Corp plans to invest more than USD15 million in New Castle to purchase and renovate the 982,000 sqft. (88,380 sqm) former Metaldyne Corp building and purchase new machinery.

Indiana Lt Gov Becky Skillman and Crown executives disclosed the project during a 17 October ceremony and say the expansion should create up to 150 jobs by 2013.

The state's Indiana Economic Development Corporation (IEDC) offered Crown up to USD1.2 million in performance-based tax credits based on the company's job creation plans. The city of New Castle is expected to consider additional property tax abatement at the request of the Henry County Development Center Inc.

Currently, Crown has more than 580 employees at seven locations in Indiana. Crown plans to begin hiring additional manufacturing, maintenance and service personnel soon to coincide with New Castle facility improvements and expanded manufacturing capacity.

"Indiana's low cost of doing business and Crown's continuing commitment to our state is once again creating opportunities for east central Indiana workers," Skillman says.

Crown President Jim Dicke III says: "The New Castle facility gives Crown the needed floor space to support our expanding product line. In addition, the location is centrally located to our other facilities, which affords us some logistics benefits. We have had great success with our other operations in Indiana and we look forward to continuing that success."

New Bremen, Ohio-based Crown operates 11 manufacturing facilities in North America, Europe, Asia and Australia.

In May, Crown said it hired Browning Construction Inc to nearly double the size of a facility in Greencastle, Indiana (Forkliftaction.com News #513). The project is nearing completion.

For the Greencastle project, the IEDC offered Crown up to USD1.3 million in performance-based tax credits and up to USD100,000 in training grants based on the company's job creation plans. The Greencastle City Council approved a 10-year tax abatement on costs of construction and equipment. Crown began operations at the Greencastle facility in 1995.

Both Crown sites are near the state capital of Indianapolis, with New Castle about 35 mi. (56 km) to the east and Greencastle 20 mi. (36 km) to the west.