London lands three new industries, more than 200 jobs

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More than 200 industrial jobs will land in London as three manufacturers buy land here with plans to build new plants, the head of the city’s economic development agency says.

City council, at its Tuesday meeting, approved the sale of three parcels of land in industrial parks to businesses in the technology, food processing and manufacturing sectors, Kapil Lakhotia, chief executive of the London Economic Development Corp. said on Wednesday.

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“We’re delighted to welcome three advanced manufacturing companies to London that are very diverse. We expect all three will bring more than 200 jobs to the community,” he said.

Only one business was named: Maple Armor Group, which makes residential, commercial and industrial alarm systems. The other two are numbered companies whose owners do not yet want to be identified, Lakhotia said.

“We like to hit home runs but we will take singles and doubles, too,” he said. “This is diversifying the manufacturing sector.”

Here are the specifics of the land buys:

• Maple Armor Group Corp. bought 14 acres (5.6 ha) of land in Innovation Park phase four on Boyd Court, north of Highway 401 off Veterans Memorial Parkway, at a cost of $2.9 million.
• Another business bought 9.7 acres (four ha) in Innovation Park phase one for $2 million.
• A manufacturer paid $2.9 million for 14 acres (5.6 ha) in Huron Industrial Park in the area of Huron Street just west of Veterans Memorial Parkway.

For Maple Armor, a Chinese-based business with global operations, the London plant will employ about 50 when it opens, most likely in 2026. It will serve as its Canadian head office and its first manufacturing plant in Ontario, said chief operations advisor Harry Yang.

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“We’re very excited. We looked around southern Ontario at a lot of different cities and we liked how London wanted to sell only to manufacturers who wanted to build,” Yang said. “I like that philosophy, it makes me optimistic about the future.”

He also credited the location, close to Buffalo and Detroit, as a reason to build here because the plant will ship alarm systems into the U.S. as well as across Canada, and even overseas if there is demand. “London is not too big but it’s big enough to have labour. It has a lot of potential.”

As for the city’s industrial land inventory, London has about 150 acres (60 ha) left in Huron Industrial Park and 77 (31 ha) acres in Innovation Park. But Lakhotia wants to add more land for future suppliers to the Volkswagen electric vehicle battery plant opening in St. Thomas in 2027.

 “We’re confident we will have land ready for immediate needs but we have to keep an eye on the future, for sure,” Lakhotia said.

There are several hundred more acres also available that’s in the hands of private land owners, he added. 

ndebono@postmedia.com

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