麻豆视频

On Thursday, Oct. 17, local business Seed Hawk based in Langbank was bought out by the Swedish company V盲derstad.

A partner with Seed Hawk since 2006, the acquisition came at an integral time for V盲derstad as the Stark family who founded the business is planning on expanding their market into the United States corn production.

Having developed a new, high-speed precision corn planter V盲derstad was looking for a way to corner the North American market and Seed Hawk was initially charged with designing a larger frame for the equipment.

"[W]e were starting to talk about our frame design for North America because in Europe 40 feet wide is their 'big one,' where as here 40 feet is our small one," Pat Beaujot, Founder and Director of Seed Hawk explained. "So, they put us in charge of designing the frame for it, which was a huge opportunity for Seed Hawk we started planning expansions last May."

"We've been trying to decide how to work together in the U.S. market and building stuff in Sweden and shipping it doesn't work, so they wanted to manufacture these products in North America"

At first V盲derstad searched for an area in the United States closer to the corn belt; but, Seed Hawk brought up the fact that they already had a North American manufacturing plant, which if expanded could meet V盲derstad's needs.

"[W]e were working on the frame already and we said, 'You know, you've already got a manufacturing plant in North America, so they searched costs and comparison with the freight and everything they agreed with us," Beaujot said.

"They have a world class factory in Sweden and that's how they do things, so they would want to invest a lot here and to do that they wanted to have controlling interest of the company and that made sense. I could understand that; so, Brian [Dean] and I weren't really looking to operate our exit strategy at all, but you know we didn't want to get in the road of this opportunity either it seemed to make sense to us to sell the rest of the company to them."

Crister Stark went on to explain, "We brought some new products out to market and we knew there would be good opportunity for them in North America; but, we also knew that without a presence in North America, without being able to produce them here that it would be hard."

"We discussed it and the best thing would be to keep on building here at Langbank keep that as a platform for V盲derstad and Seed Hawk. And from that we decided, yes, that we'd require the whole company because there would be investments in the future, so it's very good."

Overall Beaujot is excited for what this means to the local area: "this will be expanding, we've already grown, you know, from a few employees six or seven years ago to 250 today and that's just going to keep growing the investment they'll make here is huge and they think in the long term"

Together, moving forward, the Stark's and those at Seed Hawk will continue working together to bring quality products to the world.

"Right now we will do our best with V盲derstad/Seed Hawk and keep growing with both companies" Christina Stark, CEO of V盲derstad, explained.

"New products, new manufacturing techniques, develop new markets, and develop the agriculture," Crister added. "There are 10 billion people on this world that should be fed."

"[E]veryday there's more and more people on Earth and there's a lot of things we can live without; but, we certainly can't live without food," Christina stated. "So, if we can do things right and keep on bringing good technique and good service and good knowledge to the farmers then we will be able to keep on growing together with our customers."

Though now 100 percent bought out by V盲derstad all employees of Seed Hawk will continue on and more opportunities will develop as the manufacturing facility grows in Langbank with the planned expansion to be even larger than Seed Hawk had drawn up in May.

Though acquired by a Swedish company, the focus is on the local area, and in this it was important to keep Beaujot, Brian Dean, and Peter Clarke on with Seed Hawk.

"It's very important for us to ensure that Pat and Brian stay with the company because their knowledge, their innovations, and their knowledge of agriculture has brought the company to where it is, of course with all the people, the employees here," Christina explained. "And also, we ensured that Peter Clarke could stay on as CEO and President, since he has proven to be a very good leader"

Beaujot will stay on as spokesman, founder and Executive Director of Market Development while serving on the Board of Directors. Dean will remain on moving from VP of Product Development to Executive Director of Strategic Product Development, while also serving on the Board of Directors.

"I'm really excited about it" Beaujot stated. "I'll continue to promote the Seed Hawk products and we'll continue to grow we've got a lot of great things happening in Australia, I think there's a no-till movement in Europe that we're going to capture a little bit better we've guaranteed to stay on for five years and that can carry on for longer if we want"

Since, the 2006 partnership Seed Hawk has grown seven times and all invested parties are excited for the future commitment to each other.

"we quickly grew to what we are today, which is more like a $70 million company from a $10 million when they bought part of us, so we've grown seven fold since we started," Beaujot explained.

"[I]t's been very good development and now there are Seed Hawk machines, many, many in Canada, but also in other countries," Crister stated. "I think we've taken Seed Hawk machines to something like 15 countries, many places. So, it's been very good cooperation and this company has grown."

Together the Stark family and Seed Hawk family will continue to grow together offering quality and innovation for the agricultural community, while giving back and developing the local community.