By Steve Toloken
STAFF REPORTER / ASIA BUREAU CHIEF
Published: August 7, 2014 4:02 pm ET
Updated: August 7, 2014 4:05 pm ET
Image By: Specchidea srl
Specchidea srl's mirror sheets in use at a concert event.
Acrylic sheet producer Plaskolite Inc., the largest maker of mirror sheet in the United States, said August 4 that it’s buying the mirror sheet business of Italian competitor Specchidea srl as part of a focus on expanding into Europe.
The company is purchasing both the production equipment and product line from Turin-based Specchidea, and will either move the equipment to a new facility it is building in Turkey or back to the United States, said Mitchell Grindley, vice president of sales at Columbus, Ohio-based Plaskolite.
Specchidea was the largest supplier of mirror sheet in Europe, he said.
“We are definitely strengthening our position in Europe,” Grindley said. “We are doing the cast products in Turkey and have a major share of the mirror business. Europe is a strong focus for us.”
Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. Plaskolite previously supplied Europe from its North American factories.
Plaskolite, which employs more than 475, has five factories in the United States and one in Mexico, along with its new cast acrylic sheet factory in Malatya, Turkey, a joint venture with local thermoformer and extruder Işik Plastik.
Plaskolite claims to be the largest privately owned maker of continually processed acrylic sheet products in the United States, and has been expanding via acquisitions in recent years.
In 2012, it bought the glycol-modified PET sheet business of Bayer MaterialScience LLC and the sheet-related assets of Pexco LLC. | 
