By By JOHN EBY / Dowagiac Daily News
When the dust settles, Autocam-Pax will have tripled its Dowagiac operation on Percy Street. The local plant is part of a global manufacturer with 14 facilities on five continents that produce automotive and medical products.
It has operated here for 13 years.
Autocam-Pax has grown rapidly to 147 employees with its acquisition of a Canadian factory whose machinery was transferred here.
Truck convoys moved more than 200 machines to Dowagiac since January, including grinders, vertical and horizontal machining centers and turning centers.
"We've increased our employment by more than 100 people in four to five months," General Manager Verlin Bush informed Dowagiac City Council Monday night. "We've got a lot of growth pains we're still going through. Probably 99 percent of what we do is automotive – precision machining, grinding, turning and induction type heat treating. We're still looking for a lot of good people who are machinists and engineers. We've had to do a lot of facility upgrades to handle it. The city has helped out with some of those (electrical) upgrades."
Autocam-Pax operates three shifts around the clock, seven days a week.
Bush said he hasn't had a day off since May, although "that will back down, obviously" to a five-day work schedule.
After a public hearing City Council granted Autocam-Pax's request for a 50-percent industrial facilities tax (IFT) abatement for real property improvements of $625,000 for 12 years and personal property investments of $3,421,980 for six years for new machinery and equipment.
Autocam-Pax expects to retain 46 jobs and to create 44 new jobs.
"It appears you're investing roughly $4 million," William Lorenz observed. "That's something to be proud of. My view is you're keeping that information pretty much under the hat. The community at large, I believe, is unaware."
"There's a lot of extra capacity that we've moved in to grow the business even further," Bush said. "There's definitely room for increased sales and more jobs. Right now, we're trying to keep under the roofs we have. That's not to say brick and mortar is not in the future. Hopefully, it is."