No word yet on effect to PTC location

Gardner Denver Inc., which has a manufacturing facility in Peachtree City among its worldwide holdings, has announced it will cut 9 percent of its global salaried workforce and enact a hiring freeze in light of “deteriorating global economic decisions” and as it integrates its acquisition of CompAir Holdings Limited.

How any changes will affect the Peachtree City facility is unknown at this point as a company official was unavailable for comment today. Approximately 188 people are employed at the Peachtree City location, according to the Fayette County Development Authority.

Gardner Denver produces blowers, vacuums and compressors that are used in manufacturing, for liquid transportation including petroleum products, and for appliances as small as vacuums used in dental offices.

According to the company’s website, the Compressor and Vacuum Products segment of Gardner Denver operates production facilities around the world including twelve plants in the U.S., six in Germany, three in the United Kingdom, three in China, and one each in Italy, Finland and Brazil. The most significant facilities, according to the company, include owned properties in Quincy, Illinois; Sedalia, Missouri; Peachtree City, Georgia; Sheboygan, Wisconsin; Princeton, Illinois; Bradford and Gloucester, United Kingdom; Zibo and Wuxi, China; Campinas, Brazil; Bad Neustadt, Memmingen, and Schopfheim, Germany; and leased properties in Trumbull, Connecticut; Tampere, Finland; Puchheim and Nuremburg, Germany; and Qing Pu, China.
The Peachtree City manufacturing facility is referred to as “state of the art” on the company’s website.

Gardner Denver, Inc. is a global manufacturer of highly engineered reciprocating, rotary and vane compressors, liquid ring pumps and blowers for various industrial and transportation applications, pumps used in the petroleum and industrial markets, and other fluid transfer equipment serving chemical, petroleum, and food industries.

The company's products and engineered solutions are sold through multi-channel, worldwide distribution systems and are used for applications in virtually every market sector, ranging from industrial movement, to environmental processes, to healthcare applications and energy production.

Revenue in 2007 was $1.9 billion and net income was $205.1 million or $3.80 per fully diluted share, according to the company’s 2007 report to shareholders.
Until this year, the company reported that revenues “have increased at a compound annual growth rate of more than 20 percent since 1995,” its first full year as an independent public company.

Over that same period, “net income has grown even faster, increasing at a compound annual growth rate of more than 27 percent.” the company’s 2007 report said.

Gardner Denver’s report said that the company “works behind the scenes in the energy sector with products that help bring oil and natural gas up from the ground, transport them to refineries or end-users, and turn them into electric power.” Also, the company provides equipment “in a wide variety of environmental applications, including wastewater treatment, water distribution, emissions control, dust and vapor recovery, soil remediation and surface cleaning and preparation.”

Gardner Denver is the largest blower company in the world and its 2007 revenue in that product line was reported at $1.4 billion. The company was named one of Forbes magazine’s “400 Best Big Companies in America” in January.

The Georgia Department of Labor has not been notified of any job cuts at the company, but the law only requires such notice in certain situations including if more than a third of the workforce is being laid off, DOL officials said.

Typically companies who don’t meet that threshold will still notify DOL to make sure the state’s services are available for affected employees, DOL officials said.