South Milwaukee-based
Steele Solutions Inc., a manufacturer of work platform solutions for distribution facilities that enable sortation and fulfillment functions, has opened a 40,000-square-foot tech center in West Allis.
Steele Solutions is an anchor tenant at Summit Place, located at 6737 W. Washington St.
Approximately 100 Steele Solutions employees across departments including finance, human resources, supply chain, quality, sales and marketing have moved into the space. The company employs about 300 people in the Milwaukee area.
Bringing all of these departments together under one roof to foster collaboration and innovation was central to the company’s decision to open a new space, said
Matthew McBurney, president of Steele Solutions.
"I think attracting new talent to a space that is centrally located, that has a really cool vibe and is focused on innovation, is really important," said McBurney. "The majority of our people in the Milwaukee area are technical. They are engineers, drafters and designers. Bringing all those people into a common space and allowing them to innovate was important for us.”
The tech center houses several collaboration areas along with large training areas and smaller design training offices.
The decision to open the new space was also spurred by continuous growth within Steele Solution’s manufacturing business. The booming e-commerce industry has caused Steele Solutions to experience "above market growth," McBurney said.
Steele Solutions partners with industry-leading integrators who lead warehouse automation projects for the largest e-commerce retailer in the United States, as well as large parcel providers who continue to invest heavily in their distribution and fulfillment networks to keep up with the rise in e-commerce and package volumes.
"There's a lot of growth in the e-commerce industry," said McBurney. "The big four driving our growth are Amazon, UPS, the United States Postal Service, which has been automating their regional centers over the last couple years, and Walmart."
To support the company’s growth, McBurney said he does anticipate hiring new employees. He did not have an estimate as to how many employees the company is looking to add, but said the business wants to “keep pace with growth.”
Steele Solutions plans to keep its headquarters in South Milwaukee. The company occupies approximately 320,000 square feet of manufacturing and warehouse space at the former Bucyrus campus, located at 1117 E. Rawson Ave.