ARO Group sold to Langley Holdings

, the UK engineering group, has announced that it had acquired the French-based

from German automation group,

for an undisclosed fee. ARO is a producer of resistance welding equipment, principally to the automotive industry.

Headquartered in Chateau-du-Loir, ARO comprises ARO SAS in France and Savair in the USA, together with other subsidiaries in the UK, Belgium, Germany, Slovakia and China. ARO has around 600 employees worldwide and 2006 revenues of €100m.

Langley is a privately owned engineering group operating globally which, together with ARO, is forecasting 2007 revenues of around €500m. The group now employs around 2200 people, mainly in Europe and the US.

Langley's two main divisions prior to the ARO deal are based in Germany: Piller, the top-end power protection systems producer, which Langley acquired from German utility, RWE in 2004 and Claudius Peters, the cement and steel plant machinery specialist, acquired from Babcock International in 2002.

The group's third division, based in the UK, comprises mainly of a number of smaller specialised capital equipment businesses including Clarke Chapman based in Leeds and Wakefield, which the group acquired from Rolls Royce in 2000.