Albany International to close Lisarow plant

The move is a blow to the manufacturing industry on the Central Coast, particularly as Albany has been seen as an industry leader in the region since establishing at Lisarow some forty years ago. At one stage the company employed around 350 people.

The transfer of production – which will affect sixty-one employees – will take place over the next twelve months and is expected to be completed by June 2010. Managing Director, Ken Knight said that a comprehensive career transition and outplacement program has been established to assist employees and full severance and entitlements will be paid to all affected employees.

In a statement last month from New York, Albany International Corporation said, “These actions are part of an ongoing, company-wide effort to streamline operations, driven by existing and anticipated market conditions, and in no way reflect on the performance of the sixty-one affected employees, who will be offered severance and outplacement assistance. The transfer of production will be supervised by technical and manufacturing personnel from Lisarow to ensure continuity of customer supply and is expected to be completed by June 2010.”

The move follows a major restructure two years ago when Albany spun off their global filtration technology business to an Australian private equity group – All Filtration Technologies Australia Pty Ltd (AFT). AFT leased the existing floor space at Albany’s Lisarow plant and continue to manufacture filtration media for the global market.

At the same time, Albany Door Systems – a division of Albany International – which operated from a factory at West Gosford manufacturing and servicing Rapid-Roll Doors relocated its manufacturing of their doors to China. Following that restructure the Lisarow plant continued to focus on the manufacture of felts for the fibre-cement industry as it was already the world’s biggest supplier of fibre-cement felts.

At the time Managing Director, Ken Knight said, “Our challenge will now be to grow this part of our business into a long term and sustainable asset. As leaders in this technology and with ongoing research and development we aim to maintain and expand our lead in the global marketplace.”

While the local company had achieved this goal, events in the global paper making industry continued to move at a rapid rate with China becoming a world leader in paper production in the space of just ten years. Albany’s U.S. parent was forced to streamline operations, closing down numerous plants in the U.S. and elsewhere. Their Australian operation has, by necessity, caught up in the changes needed to remain profitable and expand their share of the global market. Albany will retain a presence in the Gosford area for the remaining customer service, sales and technical personnel.

Albany International is a global advanced textiles and materials processing company. Its core business is being the world’s leading producer of custom-designed fabrics and belts essential to the production of paper and paperboard as well as fibre-cement products.

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