LOUISVILLE, Ky. — WILA USA, an industry-leading producer of tooling systems for sheet metals, announced it would be relocating its North American headquarters and establishing manufacturing operations in Jefferson County with an $11.5 million investment creating 24 quality Kentucky jobs.
The project comes in response to the company’s commitment to expanding its presence in the North American market and leveraging the region’s dynamic manufacturing ecosystem. This investment will allow the company to enhance its customer service capabilities and strengthen relationships with existing and prospective clients in North America while reducing lead times, increasing flexibility and delivering tailored solutions to meet the specific needs of the region’s manufacturing sector. WILA’s new facility will be located in an existing 52,000-square-foot building and feature state-of-the-art manufacturing technologies, enabling the company to deliver cutting-edge solutions across various industries. The new facility will serve as the company’s first location in the Commonwealth.
“We are excited to relocate our corporate headquarters to Louisville and establish our North American manufacturing operations,” said Hans Willemsen, CEO of WILA. “This strategic move will allow us to strengthen our market presence, improve customer service and further collaborate with our valued partners in North America. We are confident that our investment in Louisville will accelerate our growth and enable us to better serve our customers’ evolving needs.”
Founded in 1932, WILA is a global Dutch-based company specializing in clamping, crowning and tooling systems for press brakes and distributing them to end users and original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) worldwide. The company employs 350 people across its two factories in the Netherlands and subsidiaries in the United States and China. WILA USA was established in February 1999 and has grown to play a key role for the company, generating over $20 million in annual sales.
To encourage investment and job growth in the community, the Kentucky Economic Development Finance Authority (KEDFA) in March 2023 preliminarily approved a 10-year incentive agreement with the company under the Kentucky Business Investment program. The performance-based agreement can provide up to $675,000 in tax incentives based on the company’s investment of $11.56 million and annual targets of:
- Creation and maintenance of 24 Kentucky-resident, full-time jobs across 10 years; and
- Paying an average hourly wage of $42.77, including benefits across those jobs.
By meeting its annual targets over the agreement term, the company can be eligible to keep a portion of the new tax revenue it generates. The company may claim eligible incentives against its income tax liability and/or wage assessments.
In addition, WILA USA can receive resources from Kentucky’s workforce service providers. Those include no-cost recruitment and job placement services, reduced-cost customized training and job-training incentives.
