HIGH PROFILE
Astec and TerraSource – synergies and insights
On July 1, 2025, TerraSource Global was acquired by Astec Industries for US $ 245 million. IM Editorial Director Paul Moore recently sat down with Kevin Hambrice, TerraSource Global Vice President – Materials Solutions.
Q Can you give some idea of the TerraSource evolution up to the point of the acquisition?
To understand the strengths of TerraSource Global, you need to go back to 2021, which was when the business was carved out of a larger industrial platform public company called Hillenbrand; and another company, Right Lane Industries, obtained majority ownership and full operational control. That included TerraSource and its three major brands – namely Jeffrey Rader, Gundlach Crushers and Pennsylvania Crusher. You would normally find Pennsylvania Crusher and Gundlach Crushers units operating in limestone, coal, salt and potash operations in mining. The Jeffrey Rader line comprises our vibratory feeder technology, which has potential in most industrial minerals and general mining applications. Then we acquired a business called Elgin Separation Solutions in 2023, which brought screening technologies in the form of Tabor Machine which makes the screens themselves; plus Norris Screen & Manufacturing which makes the screen media. We also were able to take on the CSI / CMI Screen Dryer line, and also a high speed centrifuge line called Kemtron. TerraSource equipment was offered worldwide both through dealer partnerships as well as direct selling. Prior to our acquisition by Astec, in 2025, Terrasource employed 400 people in the US, Canada,
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India, China, and Sweden with 15 locations, and manufacturing was located at nine of those. So, we had a pretty strong footprint for smaller company, but we were also very profitable and had achieved that in a short period of time – a lot of it through our robust aftermarket business. We bought another important business in May 2024, Peninsula Iron Works out of Portland, Oregon. They became an aftermarket rebuild and refurb arm.
Q Why was the business an attractive fit for Astec?
Astec were already very strong in aggregates. We were in aggregates too, but we were stronger in other markets like mining, power and forestry. While a primary factor in Astec’ s interest was our profitability due to our aftermarket position, they also saw more markets to grow in, and mining was certainly one of those. Looking at mining in more detail, when we think about mining at TerraSource in terms of our portfolio and installed base, we are mainly thinking about soft rock – potash, trona, phosphate, salt, gypsum, other industrial minerals, even specialised ores for things like lithium and tungsten. And also caliche ore for nitrates and iodine. Within this sector we have a number of major customers – SQM, Nutrien, JR Simplot, Compass Minerals, K + S, Mosaic, Intrepid and many others. Many of these are 30 year plus customers that have become very experienced with and reliant on our crusher technology. We are also in the limestone market, both in aggregates but also in the ground calcium carbonate space. And through Tabor Machine and Pennsylvania Crusher we have a major market in coal screening as well. So what was attractive to Astec was this multimarket focus and our robust focus on service and parts. In addition, I would say they appreciated our business culture and heritage, and the richness of our brands. Our brands on average are over 100 years old.
Q On the flip side, what did becoming part of Astec bring to TerraSource as a business? And where there any overlaps?
From our side, Astec is also a truly global company but on an altogether different scale so it gave us a whole new level of channel to market horsepower. Looking at their offering, in some cases they had similar product lines under Telsmith, Kolberg- Pioneer and JCI with regard to screens for example, but they were more aimed at the general aggregate market rather than mining, which represents new challenges in terms of robustness and design given that most mining operations run 24 / 7. There are other differences. In the aggregate space, the media part of the screen business is almost always dealt with a third party. For our media, for our vibratory screens, we make the media, including wedge wire, profile wire and polyurethane panels – with demand dependent on material size and the application. Finally, our Jeffrey Rader operation in Duncan, South Carolina also happens to house our TerraSource demonstration and testing centre – this is a test centre for all our crushing technologies including Pennsylvania Crusher and Gundlach. Customers can check at a smaller scale if the crusher will get their material to the granular size they need. We can also test our feeder technology there. We’ ve got over 3,000 different tested materials in our databank. So this kind of expertise is really useful for Astec as well.
Q What about sales synergies? And how is TerraSource now going to market – both independently and as part of a packaged approach with other Astec brands?
We are going to market with the whole Astec suite of products and solutions – in our case especially under the Astec Material Solutions division that covers heavy-duty rock processing, crushing, screening, washing, and material handling equipment. In fact, if you look at all of our screening lines, combining what they had and what we brought, we are now able to offer customers many different tiers of screening. There was actually very little overlap and a lot of great
International Mining | OCTOBER 2026