Germany-based Continental completed its acquisition of Veyance Technologies, Inc., Fairlawn, Ohio, boosting Continental’s worldwide industrial business.

Veyance manufactures hoses, conveyor belts and power transmission belts out of 27 plants around the world, including United States, Latin America, Africa, China and other countries in Asia.

“By integrating Veyance in our ContiTech division, we are expanding our global position in rubber and plastics technologies. In addition, this acquisition will bring Continental a significant step closer to its strategic goal of further increasing the proportion of industrial and end-customer business in its sales,” says Dr. Elmar Degenhart, chairman of Continental. “Continental has financed the acquisition entirely from liquid funds and available lines of credit. Veyance will make an immediate positive contribution to the corporation’s profitability.”

“Both the workforce and the customers stand to profit from the merger of the two companies,” adds Heinz-Gerhard Wente, chief executive officer of the ContiTech division, which includes conveyor belt group (conveyor belt systems), fluid technology (hoses and hose assemblies) and power transmission group (power transmission belt systems). “Veyance will complement ContiTech in markets in which we have been under-represented up till now. Another very important point is that the acquisition will enable us to significantly expand our industrial and end-customer business, and as a result, enable ContiTech to achieve a share of almost 60% of its sales outside the automotive original equipment sector.”