BACKGROUND :
When the Australian Government decided to withdraw their financial support to manufacturing cars produced in Australia, all remaining Car Producers within a few months form each other announced to close their manufacturing plants. in October 2017 Toyota, the largest of all, ceased production at their plant in Altona North, a suburb of Melbourne (Victoria).
TYPE OF SALE :
Private Treaty Sales and a series of Auction Sales while the plant was still in operation and followed up with a series of Online Auction Sales in until the middle of 2018.
EQUIPMENT :
The Machinery & Equipment at the Toyota manufacturing facility was extensive and state-of-the-art; This plant produced 3.4 Million Toyota Camry, Aurion and Avalon vehicles, including hybrid automobiles since 1994. The site comprised of 77 Acres (30 Ha.) and employed 2.500 workers, producing 100.000 cars per year. The majority of the equipment was less than 10 years old and included a lot of Toyota’s own technology.
TRANSACTION :
After talking to Toyota for almost one year, Hilco and Gray’s-Online, an Australian auction house, were appointed in the middle of 2016 to dispose of all Machinery & Equipment and handle the project management on behalf of Toyota.
HIGHLIGHT :
In January 2017 we started the Private Treaty Sales, which lasted for a little over 12 months and at the end of 2017 and early 2018 we held a number of Online Auction Sales and we finished the project at the end of 2018. Most of the machines were sold to buyers from Asia, however a fair number of machines were sold to North- and South American, European and Australian buyers.
CONCLUSION :
This was a complicated project, but due to excellent planning from both parties, the execution went very smooth and all finished ahead of time.
