1/31/2022 – Marlin Steel has acquired the assets of Madsen Wire, an Indiana-based maker of wire products that was founded in 1938, and the new owner plans to bolster further growth.

A press release said that Madsen Wire, based in Orland, Indiana, makes security partitions for fleet vehicles, and is one of the largest manufacturers of wire mesh, wire grid, wire mats and forms and refrigerator shelves. The acquisition price was less than $10 million, said Drew Greenblatt, president of Marlin Industries and Madsen Wire.

“The combination of the two companies will allow Madsen and Marlin to ship faster and provide much more capacity to handle bigger jobs, since so many opportunities are coming back from China,” Greenblatt said in an announcement. “We are all in on USA manufacturing.”

Madsen Wire Products reported that it plans to hire additional workers in Indiana to help serve new clients and surging demand. The company was said to have recently invested millions of dollars in robotic welding and wire forming technology.

Madsen Wire General Manager Steve Cochran said there were many positives to come from the acquisition. He noted that Madsen Wire was focused on quality and on-time delivery. “By adding the strong suit of Marlin’s engineering team, our footprint will become global.”

Greg Parker, one of the sellers of Madsen Wire, said that the deal is a good fit as the companies share common goals and interests, including safety. “Marlin Steel’s history of safety (1,400-plus days) and Madsen’s history of safety (1,000-plus days) were a big factor in our getting comfortable with each other. I wanted our employees to have a company that embraced the safety culture as we did. Marlin and Madsen’s team gets safety.”

Greenblatt said he wants to aggressively grow the Madsen workforce— now about three dozen employees—by about 20%, to keep up with new business. “We’re planning to get Madsen to 45 or so in the next couple of weeks. We just want smart people who want to be part of a growing company.”

1/31/2022 – Finnish network supplier Cinia and North American telecom company Far North Digital have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to build a subsea fiber optic cable for internet and data transport in the Arctic, with Alcatel Submarine Networks chosen as the supplier for the 14,000 km of cable.

A report in Hugh North News outlined the following backdrop to the project, which seeks to reduce the optic distance between Asia and Europe and minimize delays in data traffic. Last March, Finnish Cinia had announced that it would work with North Norwegian company Bredbåndsfylket AS and the Russian company Megafon on the project, called Arctic Connect. The goal was to lay a cable via Kirkenes, Norway and the Northeast Passage along the Russian Arctic. However, in May, the project was shelved due to delays in negotiations, and now Cinia is working on the project with new partners and no Russian participation.

The new plan is for the cable to run from Japan through the Northwest Passage to Europe, with side-cables touching land in Finland, Ireland and Troms County, Norway. It is scheduled for completion by the end of 2025.

Far North Digital Technical Director Guy Houser said that the new cable will increase speed and improve security for telecommunications between countries in the Arctic. Japan is the main hub for the new cable.

Professor Jun Murai at Keio University, a special advisor to the Japanese Cabinet, said in a press release that the Arctic connection between Japan and North Europe has long been of interest to Japan and the company Cinia, as diversity of international connections is crucial for Japan. “Japanese Prime Minister Kishida has presented a plan to build new landing points around the various islands where the cable will run. My long-term plan about Hokkaido being a natural gateway to the North and East is beginning to come true,” he said.

Alcatel Submarine Networks will provide project design and installation. The costs related to production, laying down the cable, and landings, is estimated to be nearly US$1 billion.

1/31/2022 – Sweden’s Lämneå Bruk is expanding its production facilities, building two new additional halls for assembling wire machinery and equipment behind the existing workshop.

A press release said that the wire machinery manufacturer experienced a turnaround in 2021. Following a temporary drop in sales due to the Covid-19 pandemic and worldwide uncertainties in 2020, Lämneå Bruk recovered stronger than ever, and recorded some of their best results in the company’s more than 100-year history.

The company has big plans. It is expanding its production area and has invested in new equipment to move even further towards process automation and Industry 4.0. The two new halls are expected to be completed soon, and the plan is to use one of them for welding robots that will help make production even more efficient, and bring Lämneå Bruk closer to having a fully automated and streamlined production process.

Based in Ljusfallshammar, Lämneå Bruk is located in the middle of the forest, surrounded by lakes. The company has continued to hire more employees.

1/31/2022 – SAMP USA reported two key positions. Sandy Scroggs, who has been with the company for more than 30 years, has been promoted to general manager. He will keep his current position as service manager. He started with SAMP in 1988 as a service technician, and was named service manager in 2000. Brett Hamner has been named senior sales manager. He started his career in 1982 with Belden, working in different engineering roles, before transitioning in 1988 to Harbour Industries, where he was an R&D engineer. He joined General Cable in 1989, working in engineering, then moved into a corporate engineering role at their headquarters in Kentucky. In 1995, he became a project manager for Nokia Maillefer in Norcross, Georgia, and soon after added sales responsibilities. In 1997, he moved to Ontario, Canada, working with Ceeco during a period that saw the creation of Nextrom, before starting his own company—Cable and Tubing Solutions—in 2003. Based in Williamsport, Maryland, SAMP USA is part of Italy’s SAMP Srl, a global supplier of wire and cable drawing, extruding and bunching technology.

Ricardo (Rico) Dostal has joined Proton Products as a U.S. regional manager, based in Texas. A U.S. Navy veteran, he cultivated an interest in industrial technology while serving as an avionics electronic technician on board the USS Kitty Hawk. He then moved to Japan and served as an instructor and development team leader for three years, before working for Verizon Wireless for eight years, then five years for Rotalec USA, a distributor of industrial automation products. He started as a technician and was later promoted to application specialist for exclusive, non-contact sensor lines for the U.S. His primary focus was custom measurement and control projects, some of which featured Proton Products technology. Based in the U.K., Proton Products supplies instrumentation and control equipment for wire and cable production.

Cable Consultants Corporation has named Mason McClaugherty as vice president of sales and technical services. He has experience from three prior engineering positions with Cleveland-Cliffs, AK Steel Corporation and Service Wire Company. He holds a B.S. degree in mechanical engineering for Marshall University. He replaces Fred Hardy, an industry veteran who in 1993 was offered the position of director of technical services by company founder and owner Dr. Dimitri Stein. Based in Larchmont, New York, Cable Consultants Corporation supplies North American manufacturers with access to technology from European companies

Greg Gitto has been promoted from market development manager-PVC to director of sales & marketing-PVC for Chroma Color Corporation (CCC). He joined CCC last June though its acquisition of Color Resource, where he had worked as executive vice president since 2009. He has 20 years of extensive experience in PVC compounding and developing new PVC and olefinic products during a period that saw the inception of low-smoke PVC into plenum cable compounds. At Color Resource, he helped develop hybrid constructions with FEP, and Color Resource’s Quasar technology, now branded as ChromaQuasar, to serve the emerging XLPE wire and cable market. He holds a degree in economics from Clark University. Based in Delaware, Ohio, Chroma Color Corporation is a leading supplier of specialty color and additive concentrates for markets that include wire and cable.

1/31/2022 – The New England Chapter is ready for the Feb. 24 return to the Mohegan Sun in Connecticut, where more than a hundred people are expected to attend its annual meeting.

The annual dinner will be held for the first time at the casino’s Cabaret Theater. The event format will be the same, starting with a reception at 5:30 pm, where chapter members and others can mingle, an opportunity that has been all too rare the last two years. The new officers for 2022 will be introduced, as well as an update on the chapter’s college scholarship program."

“It will be great seeing everyone again at Mohegan Sun,” said 2021 WAI Chapter President John Accorsi, M. Holland, whose term will have ended. “It is always a fun venue for the meeting.” He said that it was unfortunate it could not be held in 2021, but the chapter was still able to remain active, holding its annual golf tournament as well as a successful webinar.

The chapter meeting will also include the traditional raffle, which along with the annual golf tournament are the key sources for funding the scholarship program. The chapter hopes to see the same level of prior year company donations for the raffle as well as sponsorships, of which there are three levels: gold, $500; silver, $250; and bronze, $150.

The cost for the event is $120 for New England Chapter members, $130 for WAI members and $140 for non-WAI members. There also is a new WAI member package of $145 for dues and the dinner, and for $15, an existing WAI member can become a New England Chapter member.

For more details on this, contact WAI’s John Markowski at 203-453-2777, ext. 121, or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Markowski, who began working as an intern for WAI in 2018 and became a full-employee last May, is the main contact for all of the Association’s chapters.