The North American Chassis Pool Cooperative (NACPC) has acquired Pratt Industries Intermodal Chassis, the joint venture cooperative reported Dec. 6. The company, now named “Pratt Intermodal Chassis LLC,” will operate as a subsidiary of NACPC.
“This acquisition sets NACPC—and our customers—up for success for years to come,” said Dave Manning, president and CEO, NACPC. “Our goal is and always has been to provide at-cost pricing of high-quality chassis to customers throughout the United States. Bringing this critical manufacturing component under our control allows us to achieve that goal, especially in such a demanding supply chain environment.
“We’re looking forward to what this means for relieving pressure at ports across the country and supplying our customers with the best available product. We have struggled to meet our customers chassis needs this year because of the lack of chassis production availability. Owning our own chassis manufacturing company will allow us the ability to meet our customer’s needs.”
In addition to acquiring the Pratt inventory and infrastructure, NACPC will also own, operate, and maintain the chassis manufacturing facility, located in Niles, Michigan, providing customers with a vertically integrated intermodal solution and NACPC with real-time insights and data about production, quantities, and quality of equipment. The facility currently is capable of producing 5,000 chassis per year. NACPC has plans to invest heavily in streamlining facility operations and ramping up production capabilities to produce up to 7,000 chassis in 2022, the cooperative noted.
“This new chapter for NACPC gives us better control of the operations and logistics of providing premium chassis to our customers,” said Jeffrey Dudenhefer, executive vice president, NACPC. “At this time, especially with the challenges the entire industry is facing, it made strategic sense for the company to bring chassis production under NACPC. We’re proud of the team who facilitated all of the behind-the-scenes of the acquisition process.”
Pratt was founded in 1973 by Bill Pratt and his father, Bob Pratt. Nashville-based private equity firm, LFM Capital, acquired Pratt Industries in 2018 and will retain the company’s large custom and specialty utility trailer business based in Bridgman, Michigan.
