Sarasota manufacturer opens automated warehouse in Italy

The robots are coming. 

At least they are in Italy: Sarasota-based Helios Technologies Inc. recently opened a new automated warehouse in Italy that can service up to 190 pallets an hour. 

The newly constructed warehouse is in Faster S.r.l., an Italian hydraulic components producer that became part of Helios in 2018. The publicly traded company, with $861.9 million in revenue in 2021, is an engineered motion control and electronic controls technology company.

“The investment made in this new state-of-the-art warehouse and logistics center in Italy exemplifies how we are utilizing our capital to make investments that we expect will drive both top and bottom-line growth,” Helios President and CEO Josef Matosevic says in a release. “The new innovative, flexible, and efficiently built automated warehouse expands our regional hydraulics capabilities in Europe and enables us to better service our customers while leveraging a best-in-class manufacturing and operating approach.”

Construction of the 22,600-square-foot building took nine months. It has the capacity to hold 6,900 pallets. 

“With this new facility, we expect to drive greater operational efficiencies, improve quality control, and enable technological enhancements that create advanced hydraulic solutions for our customers,” Matosevic says. “We are furthering our expertise in hydraulics and electronics to exceed the boundaries of today’s approach to motion control by expanding our unique pure-play position in the industry.”

In addition to increasing efficiency, the company also predicts the warehouse will help with sustainability, innovation, flexibility and growth. The layout of the building provides some unique capabilities like being expandable to handle multiple pallet sizes.

This isn’t the first big news of the year for Helios. The company announced two new operational centers and an acquisition in January. 

The two new centers include a 72,000-square-foot facility in Mishawaka, Indiana, and the Hydraulic Valve and Coupling Solutions CoE in Sarasota. The company also acquired Schultes Precision Manufacturing Inc., which is expected to wrap up in the first quarter of 2023.