Maas Group Holdings has agreed to acquire a hard rock quarry in Gladstone, Queensland, allowing its subsidiary Regional Group Australia to grow its footprint in the state.
The Gladstone site 525km north of Brisbane has been owned and operated by Earth Commodities for more than 30 years.
Regional Group general manager Richard Tomkins told Quarry this was a strategic achievement for the company.
“Gladstone is an industrial engine room of Queensland with a naturally deep harbour that offers tremendous growth opportunities into the future,” Tomkins said.
“The quarry itself is situated on a rail siding and has for many years been a major contributor to rail maintenance in the region, providing rail ballast directly onto train wagons.”
The site is approved to extract one million tonnes per year, which Earth Commodities had been supplying for a range of products such as asphalt, concrete, road sealant and pavers.
Tomkins said the site had plenty left in the tank for Regional Group to start work on.
“The site has large, consented reserves remaining which enables it to supply high-quality construction material to all market segments in the region such as road, rail, concrete and marine infrastructure projects,” he said.
The business is developing a “hub and spoke” model across Central Queensland, according to Tomkins. The Gladstone acquisition also comes less than six months after it acquired Amcor Quarries and Concrete, Amcor Excavations and Willow Tree Gravels.
These businesses are located around 110km northwest of Gladstone and allow Maas to add up to one million more tonnes of construction materials per year to its books.
The acquisition of the three businesses totalled more than $27 million and added 112 employees to the Maas workforce.
Maas managing director and chief executive officer Wes Maas said the Amcor acquisition was a big deal for his business, which he founded by himself in 2002 with a single bobcat and a tipper truck.
“The acquisition of the Amcor businesses represents a significant milestone for MGH as it allows us to expand our operating footprint into regional Queensland at a time of growing infrastructure and project development expenditure in that market,” Maas said in April.