The ferrous foundry group assembled over the past two years by private-equity group Oakland Standard Co. has a new name: The Lawton Standard Co. The portfolio – known until recently as Specialty Metals HoldCo LLC – includes five metalcasting operations, The C.A. Lawton Co., Temperform, Damascus Steel Casting Co., and C.A. Lawton Co. - Minster, OH (formerly the foundry division of Nidec Minster), and Penn-Mar Castings.
CEO Alex Lawton explained that the former name had been a temporary placeholder as the organization was put in place. “We needed time to define whom we wanted to be in the marketplace. The future of these foundries as a group has become more clear recently, and now is the perfect time for us to realign the organization for long-term growth.”
The starting point for the group, C.A. Lawton Co., De Pere, WI, foundry produces gray and ductile-iron castings (500-20,000 lbs.) and machined components.
In December 2019, C.A. Lawton Co. ownership group Oakland Standard acquired Temperform, a Novi, MI, foundry producing smaller (10 to 6,000 lbs.) steel and stainless-steel castings used in corrosive, high-temperature applications.
In July 2020, Oakland Standard purchased Midwest Manufacturing & Logistics in Minster, OH, from Nidec Minster Corp., a metal forming and machine tool builder that had operated the plant as an in-house iron foundry. The Ohio plant casts gray and ductile iron for large-dimension castings up to 45,000 lbs., for HVAC, municipal pump and valve, mining, and power generation industries.
Earlier this year it purchased Penn-Mar Castings in Hanover, PA. That plant uses an air-set, no-bake molding process to cast parts supplied to refrigeration/air conditioning, pump/compressor, and motor/generator manufacturers.
Tim Flannery, CFO of The Lawton Standard Co. and a principal at Oakland Standard Co., stated that the portfolio offers “innovation and knowledge sharing across locations. Lawton Standard is implementing the best practices from each location across the entire company. Together, we’ll work to close the generation gap, raise the talent level in the foundry space, entice manufacturers to bring more activity and ‘casting spend’ back onshore, and positively impact the communities in which we live.”