Boost for oil-free chillers as TICA acquires Smardt

TICA has completed its acquisition of the Smardt Chiller Group and announced the expansion of the group’s global manufacturing facilities to further support Smardt’s work in the oil-free centrifugal chiller category.

The two firms share a focus on energy conservation through water-side oil-free chillers and air-side AHUs and system integration. The move is aimed at offering lowest cost of system ownership for major customers, especially in critical facilities such as airports, metros, healthcare, electronics, clean rooms, and data centres.

TICA chairman Jiang Li has assumed the additional role of Executive Chairman of Smardt, succeeding Smardt and Turbocor founder Roger Richmond-Smith, who retires as chairman emeritus.

“We are very excited to renew the global growth of Smardt,” Li says, “whose strategic fit with TICA is symbiotic in terms of their shared focus on energy efficiency as well as complementary products, global market reach and global manufacturing footprint. This is an exciting time for our combined employees with increasing opportunities in many new areas.

“I would like to sincerely thank Roger Richmond-Smith for his continuous support and leadership. We will always regard Roger as the visionary founder and the soul mentor. Indeed, he was the daredevil bringing the magnetic bearing technology to the HVAC industry by his strong sense of belief and this will be followed in the future development of Smardt.”

Richmond-Smith has echoed Li’s comments and agrees that the renewed investment in oil-free technology represents an exciting time for the market.

“With TICA at the helm, I am confident that Smardt will continue to lead the oil-free sector of the global HVAC industry,” he says.

Smardt, a Canadian-based firm specialising in oil free chillers, was founded in 2005 by Richmond-Smith with a global R&D, global manufacturing operation and sales and service operations covering the Americas, Asia Pacific, Australia, China and EMEA.

TICA, established in 1991, is a professional company integrating R&D, manufacture, sales and services of total solutions in the HVAC and green energy sectors. TICA has five manufacturing bases in Nanjing, Tianjin, Guangzhou, Chengdu and Kuala Lumpur, research and development centres in China, Japan, Italy, Australia and Canada, as well as more than 100 sales and service outlets.