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July 31, 2025

Falmouth industrial manufacturer adds to global footprint with German deal

Courtesy / Southworth International At a meeting with employees of Gruse Maschinenbau GmbH & Co. in Germany, pictured, from left: Ferdinand Kraft, former Gruse owner; Tim Cabot, chairman of Southworth International Group; Southworth President and CEO James Cabot; and Ludger Helmig, managing director of Gruse. They addressed the Gruse team while standing on a Gruse product, a lift table.
By Peter Van Allen

A Falmouth company with a global footprint has added a German company to reinforce its market leadership in the material-handling business in Europe. 

Southworth International Group Inc., which is based on Gray Road in Falmouth, said it acquired Gruse Maschinenbau GmbH & Co., an established manufacturer of engineered industrial lifting equipment based in Aerzen, Germany.  Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

“Gruse is a natural fit for SIGI,” said James Cabot, Southworth’s president and CEO.  “They offer a well-recognized and long-tenured German brand, a strong history of quality and innovation, a similar customer-focused culture — as well as a physical presence in the center of the European market.” 

Southworth International Group, founded in 1890, is a privately held company with locations in North America, Europe and China. It has 500 employees worldwide and customers in more than 60 countries. It has 100 employees in Falmouth.

Its customers are manufacturers and warehousing and logistics companies. Its products are the sort of staples you'd see on almost any factory floor or warehouse: scissor-lift tables, automatic pallet positioners, portable lift tables, roll-and-coil handling equipment, powered stackers, loading dock lifts and so on. 

'Moving heavy loads'

The company's products help in distribution areas that receive ship out goods that move on pallets. The equipment helps workers move products to the transition to the next phase — for instance, from loading docks to warehouse shelves or storage to store shelves. 

Southworth specializes in products that help in "moving heavy loads — rolls of paper, that sort of thing," said Cabot, who became CEO in 2020 and joined the company as a corporate development leader in 2014. 

In addition to Falmouth, Southworth has locations in Foxborough, Mass.; Manila, Ark.; Greensburg, Ind. Globally, it has sites in Mexico, the UK, France, Sweden, China and in Wiesbaden, Germany.

Gruse, based in the northwestern German state of Lower Saxony, is a 150-year-old mechanical engineering company specializing in customized lifting solutions that support production processes and optimize material handling. Gruse has customers in 55 countries.

“This acquisition," Cabot said, "supports SIGI’s strategic plans to strengthen our portfolio of material handling solutions in German-speaking Europe and reinforces our overall position as a European leader through increased engineering and technical capabilities and expanded production capacity. We are excited to welcome Gruse to our organization.”

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