James Jones & Sons is looking for a new owner for XLAM, the Hyne Group's cross-laminated timber business in Australia and New Zealand, as the British timber group concentrates future investment on businesses closer to its core operations. XLAM operates Australia's first large-format CLT plant and has annual production capacity of around 60,000 m\u00b3.<\/p>\n
Hyne Group has started a strategic review of XLAM and invited expressions of interest from potential buyers in Australia, New Zealand, North America and Europe. While all options remain under consideration, the preferred outcome is a sale to an investor that would continue CLT manufacturing and XLAM's associated design and engineering activities.<\/p>\n
The decision is not being presented as a closure or production curtailment. Hyne said XLAM remains well placed in the mass timber market, particularly as prefabricated, modular and hybrid timber construction gains ground. The issue is instead the fit within the wider group's investment strategy: XLAM is heavily exposed to commercial construction, while Hyne intends to direct capital towards businesses more closely connected with its core timber operations.<\/p>\n
XLAM has around 60,000 m\u00b3 of annual CLT capacity<\/strong><\/p>\n XLAM is one of the established names in the Australasian mass timber industry. The business began producing CLT in New Zealand in 2012 and joined Hyne Group in 2015. It subsequently expanded into Australia, commissioning the country's first large-format CLT manufacturing plant at Wodonga, Victoria, in 2018.<\/p>\n The automated Wodonga facility covers around 16,000 m\u00b2 and has capacity of approximately 60,000 m\u00b3 of CLT per year, according to current Hyne Group figures. Panels can be manufactured up to 16 metres long and 3.4 metres wide, with CNC processing allowing components to arrive on construction sites largely ready for assembly.<\/p>\n More than A$50 million has been invested in the Australian CLT operation since its development. XLAM says its Australian and New Zealand operations have supplied more than 1,000 mass timber projects, covering commercial buildings, schools and universities, industrial projects, residential developments and aged-care facilities.<\/p>\n The Wodonga plant has supplied CLT to projects across Australia, including T3 Collingwood in Melbourne, St Luke's in Launceston, Westralia 2 in Perth and the Prince's Quarter development in Sydney.<\/p>\n Part of a much larger timber group<\/strong><\/p>\n XLAM sits within a considerably larger wood-processing operation. James Jones & Sons acquired just under 60% of Mayflower Enterprises, the holding company of Hyne Timber and XLAM, in January 2022. The transaction brought together the British timber processor and one of Australia's largest structural timber producers.<\/p>\n Hyne operates the Tuan sawmill in Queensland and Tumbarumba sawmill in New South Wales. Together, the two mills produce around 800,000 m\u00b3 of lumber annually and source approximately 1.6 million tonnes of plantation pine logs from Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria. Hyne has estimated its share of the Australian structural timber market at around 21%.<\/p>\n The group also produces glulam in Queensland. Current Hyne figures put its total log-processing capacity at around 1.1 million m\u00b3 per year, while GLT production capacity stands at approximately 10,000 m\u00b3 annually.<\/p>\n This integration has given XLAM a domestic raw-material base. Timber for CLT production can be supplied by Hyne's sawmills rather than relying entirely on external lumber purchases, an advantage the company has used in marketing the reliability of its mass timber supply chain.<\/p>\n Buyer sought beyond Australia<\/strong><\/p>\n The decision to seek expressions of interest internationally opens the process to existing mass timber manufacturers as well as investors looking for an established position in Australia and New Zealand. James Jones & Sons and Hyne are explicitly looking beyond the domestic market, with potential parties in Europe and North America also invited to participate.<\/p>\n A buyer would acquire an established CLT operation rather than a project requiring new manufacturing capacity to be built from scratch. XLAM already has production infrastructure, engineering and design capabilities, access to the Australian construction market and more than a decade of experience with mass timber projects.<\/p>\n James Jones & Sons itself operates 27 sites and employs more than 1,200 people across the wider group. Its businesses span sawmilling, pallet manufacturing, I-joists and other timber products, while Hyne provides the group with a substantial position in the Australian structural lumber market.<\/p>\n No buyer has yet been identified and no timetable for completing the strategic review has been announced. For now, XLAM continues to manufacture CLT while the group seeks expressions of interest for a business containing one of the largest established mass timber production assets in the Southern Hemisphere.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" James Jones & Sons is looking for a new owner for XLAM, the Hyne Group’s cross-laminated timber business in Australia and New Zealand, as the British timber group concentrates future investment on businesses closer to its core operations. XLAM operates … Continue reading