500 new jobs on the cards.

Byline: By Rebekah Ashby

Engineering group Tanfield hopes to create more than 500 jobs in the North-East by doubling sales at its latest acquisition.

The County Durham engineering and manufacturing firm this week snapped up Ireland-based aerial platform maker UpRight in a pounds 10.5m deal ( the biggest in Tanfield's history.

And now the company, which is based in Stanley, says it is on the lookout for massive new premises to consolidate all operations of the enlarged business on to one site in the region and cut back the Irish firm's sites in Japan and the US.

Aim-listed Tanfield says it hopes to double sales of UpRight products, which would boost its 460-strong workforce to almost 1,000.

The new jobs would be a huge boost to the North-East, which has seen 210 jobs go at South Shields circuit-board manufacturer Circatex, 400 at Stag Furniture in Sunderland and 585 at Goodyear Dunlop in Washington this year.

Chief executive Roy Stanley said: "We have already grown staff numbers from 130 to 460 in the last 18 months and we are anticipating growth by another 500 by consolidating on to one site.

"We are currently working with a number of people to build or rent a facility and there is a lot going on to try and keep it in this region.

"UpRight is shipping out 150 vehicles a month at the moment and we have got plans to double this in the next 18 months to 300.

"We need to identify a new-build as soon as possible or an existing building and we would work immediately to establish the business in that facility, but we need local government help to be able to do that."

Mr Stanley says he has received approaches from the Irish and Scottish regional development agencies keen to lure the company to relocate there.

But last night, the North-East's regional development agency One NorthEast said Tanfield was an important employer and it was currently assessing its application for financial backing.

A One NorthEast spokesman said: "Tanfield Group has made an application to One NorthEast for financial support towards its expansion plans following on from the purchase of UpRight.

"This application is currently being appraised. Tanfield Group is an important employer in the region and we have given them significant levels of grant support in the past."

Tanfield ( which said in its 2005 preliminary results on Wednesday that it increased turnover from pounds 10.7m in 2004 to pounds 22.4m ( placed 50 million new ordinary shares on the stock market yesterday (thurs) to buy UpRight, integrate it into its business and leave pounds 3.5m in the bank.

It also told the City its pre-tax operating profits were pounds 2m, compared to a pounds 5.8m loss last time, largely due to buying up rival companies.

Since last year's pounds 2.2m acquisition of SEV Group, which has a plant in Gateshead, and buying Norquip of Cheshire, the business said it had quadrupled output of its electric vehicles, thanks to increased public sector orders.