Ground has been broken on a new manufacturing facility in Belleville.
BCS Automation held a groundbreaking ceremony on Thursday for their new facility on Station Street in Belleville’s east end. The 34,000-square-foot facility will support 15 new jobs, and allow the company to retain 32 existing jobs. The facility is set to cost $10.7 million, and will increase the size of the company to 50 people.
The expansion comes after Vancouver Shipyards invested in BCS as a Canadian Supplier, amid Canada’s Nation Shipbuilding Strategy. BCS Automation makes power-control hardware for the shipyards and the new facility will include all the space, equipment and systems needed for this work to continue.
Members of BCS’s team were joined by community supporters and local leaders including Mayor Neil Ellis, who helped break ground with a golden shovel. BCS Automation President Nathan Bowland spoke about the role the National Shipbuilding Strategy has played in the company’s growth and the skilled employment the expansion will create in Belleville.
“This is exactly what the NSS is designed to do. We’re leveraging Canadian expertise in shipbuilding, expanding our ability to offer that expertise to our customers and creating great jobs here at home,” said Bowland. “We are recruiting and training people in this region to perform highly-skilled manufacturing and design work in support of the strategy. The equipment built here will help the Royal Canadian Navy and the Canadian Coast Guard renew our national fleet and patrol the Arctic. We are incredibly proud to do that work right here in Belleville.”
BCS Automation has operated in Belleville for 35 years.
