Italian Steel Machinery Maker to Invest $20M in First Phase of Forsyth County Facility

An Italian producer of machinery for the fabrication of structural steel is building a new headquarters and warehouse in Alpharetta, a $20 million investment to start that could eventually create 90 jobs across two phases.  

Ficep Group makes customized fabrication lines for steel used to build bridges, power transmission towers, data centers and more.  

Based north of Milan in the lake city of Varese, the company broke ground on the new factory in Alpharetta’s EcoPark in May, taking advantage of the sylvan setting and environmental bona fides of the 38-acre industrial park. 

The 19.23-acre site will be located adjacent to Skaltek, a Swedish packaging equipment manufacturer that lent its building to host the Italian company’s reception there on a scorching Georgia afternoon. 

Ficep’s magic comes from integrating complex systems based on customers’ particular needs, then educating and empowering their teams to utilize that machinery on their sites. 

“The most important factor is this one: We have to be close to our customers, in particular for training,” Christian Colombo, Ficep SpA’s CEO, told Global Atlanta. “When you set up a fully automated system, you need skills that stick and stay, or if they go, you need to able to compensate.”

Ficep understands the entire process, from buying the steel to storing, machining, welding and painting the pieces, and it passes that knowledge on to the customer directly.

“They can play with it. They can smell it. They can be trained on it. When it arrives, they’re less scared, and we help them carry on with the project,” Mr. Colombo said.

Ficepo operates what it calls an Academy of Technology in Italy. For five years, the company has been on the hunt for a site where it could bring the model to the U.S.  

“It’s unique,” Mr. Colombo said of its consultative approach, which brings in not only experts in steel but also CAD/software design, architecture and logistics. “We have it in Italy. It works well, and that’s where we’re going to increase our imprint. It’s more around the services than the manufacturing.”

With a longtime head office in Baltimore, Ficep looked first at Ohio, but then reconsidered after the pandemic hit. Most machinery makers are present in the Midwest, but that also means more competition for workers and attention, said Giuseppe Riva, chief executive of Ficep Corp. in the U.S. 

Mr. Riva saw the center of economic gravity shifting southward and thought the company should consider take an innovative (some may say irrational) approach. 

“I thought we should try to jump the gun, try to read the times. Business is growing more in the Southeast, more and more steel fabrication is going on in the Southeast, so let’s go there,” Mr. Riva told Global Atlanta. “At the beginning, in the industry, they were looking at us like we are crazy. More lately, several people are coming on our side, saying that this is a smart idea.”

North Carolina courted the company closely, but Atlanta had a couple of secret weapons: the technical chops of Georgia Tech, the reach of Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, and the fact that Mr. Riva had spent about 16 years in the U.S. with a home here. 

Now the company is betting on Alpharetta, which gives the executives the calm, bucolic setting they’re used to in their alpine region of Italy — one they were worried Atlanta could not provide. 

“Time will tell if we are smarter or maybe too early,” Mr. Riva said. 

In August, the site welcomed some employees from its Baltimore office to consider relocating. While a sales office will remain in Maryland and some staff members will work for the company remotely, the rest are flying south, and a few Italian engineers will come over to commission the plant and work directly with customers on the intricacies of their machinery setups. 

The site in Forsyth County flips the usual development logic on its head. Ralph Skalleberg, a Skaltek co-owner who helped design EcoPark, retains a singular focus on preserving trees and utilizing as little of the land as possible. The Skaltek building itself focuses on eliminating hierarchy, bringing in natural light and reducing energy usage. Mr. Skalleberg welcomed his Italian counterparts with open arms.

Ficep’s nearly 80,000-square-foot complex will included 19,400 square feet of office space and a 58,564-square-foot warehouse. Outside will have 85 parking spaces, with only 7 of the 19 acres disturbed. The building itself will include 72 skylights to reduce the use of artificial lighting, as well as room for a 33,202-square-foot future Phase 2 expansion. 

Forsyth County Chamber of Commerce Vice President Alex Warner said Ficep’s presence in the county is a seal of approval for the north-metro community. 

“Their decision to expand here is a powerful endorsement of our thriving business climate, talented workforce, and unmatched community support,” Mr. Warner said in a release. 

Mr. Colombo told Global Atlanta that while it deals in imported equipment and its customers work with steel, it is not being affected by the Trump administration’s metals tariffs in the short term, as most infrastructure projects are funded years in advance. Reshoring may not generate more deamnd, but “the demand is there,” and a domestic production base can only help given uncertainty about the future, he said.