ALTEC International wins major La Crosse business award

0 Comments | La Crosse Tribune, Jun 19, 1998

ALTEC International received the La Crosse Area Development Corp.'s Diamond Recognition Award Thursday in recognition of its rapid growth.

Also, the cities of La Crosse and La Crescent, Minn., and the La Crosse Area Planning Committee received the Triangle of Achievement Award for their cooperation in the January start of the Apple Express Municipal Bus Service between the two cities. And Scroll Sign Inc. and AMV, LLC were named Coulee Region Entrepreneurial Initiative Winners for winning a business plan competition.

The four awards were presented at LADCO's second Industry Appreciation Breakfast at the Radisson Center.

ALTEC, which makes industrial heat exchangers, is one of the area's top exporters, said James Hill, LADCO executive director. It obtained a $5 million industrial revenue bond in 1996 to add the world's largest aluminum vacuum brazing furnace and has added many employees since then, he said.

The La Crosse company was spun off from The Trane Co. about 12 years ago, and employment has tripled to about 380, ALTEC President Michael Wahlen said. "A lot of that has come in the last three years," he said. About half of ALTEC's production is exported to other nations, he said.

The new bus service between La Crosse and La Crescent is a good example of intergovernmental cooperation, said La Crosse Mayor John Medinger, La Crescent Mayor Mike Poellinger and La Crosse County Board Chairman Jim Ehrsam, who represented the planning committee.

AMV, LLC, a new company which plans to turn mixed broken glass into lightweight chunks used by denim apparel manufacturers to soften their products, received a $250 cash award for finishing first in an annual business plan competition. It began leasing space in the Coulee Region Business Center May 1 and will begin making foamed glass there in the next few weeks.

Scroll Sign received a $150 cash award for its second-place finish. A spin-off of the La Crosse Sign Co., it is making scroll signs for gas stations to display their prices, at a temporary location in the former Fastenal building on Gillette Street. The company plans to break ground by Sept. 1 for a permanent facility that will open by year's end in the Airport Industrial Park.