[P]aR Systems (PaR), a global leader in automated handling systems, will open a new facility at Lillyhall, Workington in early 2018 as a part of a long-term investment PaR has committed to its customers in the UK.
PaR recently agreed to an extended framework agreement to support Sellafield Ltd., allowing the company to increase its commitment to work in the area. PaR has grown its UK team and is now supporting a variety of customers in the nuclear industry for projects, which include cranes, manipulators, custom tooling, robotic handling systems and R&D for Decommissioning. PaR has been operating in the region at Seascale in the UK since 2011 to directly support the remote handling systems it supplies to Sellafield.
“Opening our new facility in Lillyhall is a critical step in continuing our rapid growth in the UK and support to businesses in the area. We’ve outgrown our previous location, and our new location will give us the space to expand our operations in the UK”, says Jon Sakry, President of PaR Systems Handling Solutions.
As PaR now opens up their ‘Remote Handling Centre of Excellence’ for Europe, this new facility will give them the space to grow within the company’s traditional marketplace of nuclear remote handling, while developing other core technology solutions into other markets, such as aerospace, automotive and commercial material handling.
The new facility will include workshops for assembly of mechanical and electrical equipment and for the building, testing and refurbishment of manipulator systems. PaR’s Remote Handling Centre of Excellence will also include specialised overhead cranes, which are essential for its larger projects such as crane manufacturing, testing of remote and robotic systems and it will also provide a demonstration facility for PaR’s EXPERTOPERATORTM crane anti-sway and motion control systems. The facility provides PaR’s growing engineering and technical team adequate office space for current staffing as well as future growth. The new facility also has classroom and conference space, which will be used for PaR’s role as a training provider and to support larger projects.
PaR will be building an ‘Inactive Demonstration Facility’ to support remote operations in both nuclear processing facilities and for decommissioning applications. This facility will mock–up a full ‘hot cell’, equipped with Master Slave Manipulators (MSM’s), a nuclear crane and a PaR robotic manipulator system, all viewed through cell windows to simulate real ‘hot cell’ environments.
John McGibbon, PaR Systems UK Managing Director shares, “I am excited for the opening of our new facility at Lillyhall, as it will allow us greater space to support our nuclear remote handling work for Sellafield and our other nuclear customers, as well as space for additional automation and handling equipment for testing, research and development. We are proud to add this location in West Cumbria and to support the local industrial businesses already established in the community.”
The move to the Lillyhall site has been assisted by the purchase of the site by local property firm Britain’s Energy Coast. “With recent news of one in five jobs set to become automated and the North likely hit worse than the South in terms of job displacement, because of its “high concentration” of warehouses and manufacturers, the sooner Cumbria grows its robotics and highly-skilled industries, the better,” commented Michael Pemberton CEO of BEC, “PaR’s expansion into this premises cannot come soon enough and we are proud to be helping them take their next step.”
PaR Systems’ new facility will bring more opportunity to the community in West Cumbria, through its building of automated systems and remote handling equipment for the purposes of helping to improve the environments of areas like Sellafield and surrounding areas, and the well-being of the people within these communities.
About PaR Systems, LLC
PaR Systems, a portfolio company of the Pohlad family’s operating companies, is a world leader in providing advanced intelligent solutions for critical material handling, automation, and robotic applications that drive customer quality, safety, and productivity. Since 1961, PaR has created fully integrated systems, which are often first-of-a-kind manufacturing solutions, for a broad range of industries including aerospace, hazardous material/nuclear, life science and process automation, marine/defense, heavy material handling, and industrial. PaR Systems is headquartered in Minnesota, USA and has engineering and manufacturing centres of excellence around the globe.
For more information on PaR Systems, please visit www.par.com.
