London-based Hanson Plc announced closing on upwards of $100 million in U.S. transactions last month, all involving material or product businesses overlapping properties of larger global players Heidelberg Cement (Lehigh Cement) in Germany and Cemex S.A. (Cemex Inc.), Monterrey, Mexico.

Expanding its Pipe & Products platform in the Southeast, Hanson has acquired Sherman Pipe, a concrete pipe and precast products business with nine plants in Alabama and Georgia. Those states had represented a void for Hanson Pipe & Products, which otherwise has a commanding Gulf Coast presence supported by Florida, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas operations. Nationwide, the acquisition reinforces Hanson Pipe & Products' lead role in concrete pipe and drainage.

For Sherman International, a Birmingham, Ala.-based platform integrated with Lehigh Cement's Leeds, Ala., mill, the pipe and precast deal continues a streamlining of businesses around ready mixed and block. It follows the company's sale of two conventional prestressed plants and stakes in specialty prestressed (Newmark, formerly Sherman Utility Structures, spun pole and KSA railroad cross tie operations) over the past decade. The narrowed focus would appear to position Sherman more favorably in Alabama, a market that since 2000 has seen rapid consolidation of small ready mixed operators at the hands of two Birmingham players, National Cement and upstart Ready Mix USA, plus Lafarge North America/Southeast in Atlanta. Adding to the Alabama dynamic is a vertically integrated joint venture Ready Mix USA and Cemex are finalizing this month (note page 6).

Concurrent with Sherman Pipe, Hanson announced the sale of its 50 percent stake in Houston ready mixed market leader, Campbell Concrete and Materials, to partner Lehigh Cement. The Campbell disposal comes two years after Hanson sold its ready-mixed operations in Texas and Arkansas to Southern Star Concrete. When Hanson sold its 50 percent interest in North Texas Cement Co. to Ash Grove Cement earlier in 2003, the company made it clear it had no ambitions to be a major powder producer in the region and only would hold ready-mixed concrete assets in those markets where it is necessary to provide a secure outlet for its aggregates. Hanson Aggregates retains its number one position in the Texas market and continues to benefit from a supply agreement involving its former ready-mixed properties.

In the San Francisco Bay area of northern California, Hanson Aggregates has added three privately owned operations — Berkeley Ready Mix Co., Mission Valley Rock Co., and Berkely Asphalt Co. With an estimated 60 million tons of permitted reserves, Mission Valley controls some of the largest remaining reserves of increasingly scarce land-based aggregates in the area, company officials contend. It produces about 2 million tpy of aggregate from a quarry near Sunol, Calif., about 30 miles from San Francisco. In addition, Mission Valley operates a Port of San Francisco sand distribution business.

Berkeley Ready Mix operates has plants in Sunol, Berkeley and Oakland. Berkeley Asphalt has two plants in Sunol and Berkeley. These three companies had combined shipments of about $75 million for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2005, and a combined net assets of about $30 million. They will be integrated into Hanson Aggregates' existing operations in northern California, where Hanson is the leader in aggregates and cement.