Hoerbiger Group headquartered in Zug, Switzerland, acquired Newson Gale, Nottingham, United Kingdom, effective January 4, 2016.

The privately owned business, of which the majority of shares has been held by the founder Ernest Kochmann and his family while a minority of shares has been owned by its CEO, Graham Tyers, provides its customers a broad range of solutions dedicated to disabling uncontrolled discharge of static electricity and eliminating ignition sources in potentially flammable and combustible atmospheres. The parties agreed to keep the purchase price confidential.

Safety, explosion mitigation, and prevention are attractive growth markets with large potential. Hoerbiger already offers a wide range of safety-related products and services. For decades, the Group has been an innovation and technology leader for explosion protection and check valves to be used in oil, gas, carbon, and dust applications, as well as in the mechanical and plant engineering industry.

Newson Gale is prominent in the field of electrostatic grounding for hazardous areas. The company has more than 30 years of experience in explosion prevention technology by providing its customers a wide range of solutions dedicated to prevent ignition by uncontrolled static electricity in hazardous areas wherever there are flammable gases, liquid vapors, or combustible dust atmospheres. Ranging from loading of road tanker trucks to emptying hand held cans, Newson Gale have a solution for virtually every explosion endangered process capable of generating static electricity.

"Safety and explosion prevention technology are attractive growth markets which ideally complement Hoerbiger’s core business and thus hold attractive development potential", said Dr. Martin Komischke, Hoerbiger Group CEO and chairman of the executive board. "With Newson Gale's reputation and know-how, we will strengthen our leading role as developer and global provider of performance-defining safety related components and services."

In September 2015, the Hoerbiger Group acquired IEP Technologies LLC, Marlborough, MA, one of the world's leading providers of sophisticated safety and explosion protection technology for a broad range of industrial plant engineering applications. The acquisition of IEP Technologies has created a platform for adding other products and services contributing to a common mission of protecting people and mitigating the hazards of explosions in industrial environments.

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