Global forklift sales leader Toyota Industries Corp. (TICO) has agreed to acquire Vanderlande Industries B.V., the Veghel, Netherlands-based material handling company, in a move that advances Toyota's ambition to increase its presence in automated material handling and offer customers total solutions from a single company. Both companies issued announcements in Europe today.

Reports out of the Netherlands pegged the purchase price at about US$1.3 billion. Toyota said it will purchase 100 percent of Vanderlande's shares through a wholly owned European subsidiary. The deal is expected to close during the second quarter of 2017, after passing customary regulatory approvals.

Toyota, which will buy Vanderlande from Dutch investment firm NPM Capital N.V., plans no changes to the company's brand, Vanderlande said in a statement. Vanderlande said it will retain its name and corporate identity, and will continue as a standalone entity from the same worldwide locations.

Toyota made the deal to expand its portfolio of automated material handling products and services, and will gain Vanderlande's expertise as a provider of value-added logistics process automation at airports, in the parcel market, and warehouses, Vanderlande said.

"Vanderlande complements our current offering by providing a full range of integrated automated material handling solutions," TICO Managing Officer Norio Wakabayashi said in a statement issued by both companies. "We also see a strong strategic match in our extensive sales and service networks. This acquisition creates even better global coverage across almost all of the markets that have a requirement for automation." Wakabayashi was named the designated chairman of Vanderlande's supervisory board.

The move comes less than two months after TICO purchased systems integrator Bastian Solutions LLC to lay the groundwork for a new division, called Toyota Advanced Logistics Solutions (TALS), to sell integrated automation and productivity solutions to material handling and logistics markets in North America.