Ingeteam selects Milwaukee site for new manufacturing facility

Ingeteam, a Spanish company that specializes in highly engineered electrical and electronic equipment and services, will construct a $15 million facility in Milwaukee’s Menomonee Valley to manufacture equipment for renewable energy projects.

“After carefully analyzing our company’s needs, we selected Milwaukee for our new production facility because the city is conveniently located for distribution of our products and has a solid industrial base from which Ingeteam can source materials,” says Ander Gandiaga, Ingeteam’s corporate director for international development.

Construction of the 100,000-square-foot combined production facility and office complex will begin in April, with completion set for December. The company expects to begin manufacturing operations in January 2011 and will employ approximately 275 workers by 2015.

When completed, the plant will focus primarily on the renewable energy industry, producing Indar wind power generators and Ingeteam converters and solar power inverters for the North American market.

“Milwaukee also has a labor pool experienced in electrical manufacturing,” says Aitor Sotes, chief executive officer of Ingeteam Inc., Ingeteam’s subsidiary in the United States. “In addition, the area boasts prestigious universities with some of the highest-ranked engineering departments in the country that offer specific courses in renewable energy, which will be very useful when it comes to finding specialized staff.”

Ingeteam currently has a 12 to 15 percent worldwide market share of wind power components and has identified the United States as a growth market for wind energy. At full capacity, the Milwaukee plant will supply equipment capable of producing 7,500 megawatts (MW) of electricity each year.

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