Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Mitsubishi Nichiyu Forklift have joined forces to take over UniCarriers whose brands include TCM and Atlet forklifts.
The UniCarriers Group was created in 2011 from the mergers of the brands Nissan Forklift, TCM and Atlet. The company is headquartered in Tokyo with branches in Europe, America and Asia. Its European headquarters are located in Mölnlycke near Gothenburg (Sweden).
On completion of the deal Mitsubishi Heavy Industries will own 65 per cent of UniCarriers and Mitsubishi Nichiyu Forklift will own the other 35 per cent.
Mitsubishi Nichiyu Forklift had sales of £1.35 billion (¥260 billion) in 2014. It was created in 2013 through the merger of Nippon Yusoki and the forklift truck section of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is a single largest shareholder in Mitsubishi Nichiyu Forklift owning just under 50 per cent of the shares.
UniCarriers had sales of £927m (€1.314bn) in 2013. It said in a statement: “MHI, MN and we will establish a preparatory committee to formulate management policy and strategy to grow the combined group to a world-class material handling player.”
There have been reports in Germany that Kion, owner of the Linde and Still brands, was also interested in buying UniCarriers.
