Joseph Lauderdale, Joins 1stWEST Mergers & Acquisitions LLC As Managing Director For Mexico

1stWEST Mergers & Acquisitions LLC is pleased to announce the appointment of Joseph Lauderdale as a Managing Director for Mexico.

Joseph Lauderdale brings over 25 years of corporate-level senior management experience in the aerospace and automotive industries. He has strong operational, start-up and turnaround experience and in-depth knowledge of the Mexican market, and specifically, the maquiladora market. Joseph has extensive mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures and transactional experience.

Joseph has a strong private company leadership background that includes CEO of Certified Fabricators, Inc., a manufacturing company engaged in development and manufacture of large electro-mechanical products for industrial and defense industries. He served as Vice President of Operations for Bearing Inspection, Inc., a FAA overhaul and repair facility specializing in the overhaul of aerospace and military aircraft engine bearings. Additionally, other senior management positions include: President and Owner of Spur Gear, Inc., and National Sales Manager and Manufacturing Engineer for ACR Industries, Inc., the world's largest independently owned aerospace gear manufacturer. Joseph is also a Principal in West Coast Holdings, LLC, a business consulting firm focused on the maquiladora market in Mexico.

Based in El Paso, Texas, Joseph will play a critical role in developing our market in Mexico. He has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Southern Illinois University.

"We are delighted and privileged to have Joseph Lauderdale join our 1stWEST M&A team and lead our efforts in Mexico. Joseph brings a unique blend of international senior experience in executive-level management and knowledge of the maquiladora market in Mexico. He also brings an in-depth knowledge of middle-market companies in the aerospace and automotive industries. Our clients will be very well served by Joseph Lauderdale," commented Ted Rieple, Partner and Co-Founder, 1stWEST Mergers & Acquisitions.

1stWEST Mergers & Acquisitions is a full service international investment banking and advisory firm that is focused on the underserved lower middle-market of companies with sales of $10 to $100 million. The firm has built a unique business solutions platform of assisting owners and shareholders in selling their company, acquiring another business or raising growth capital. With offices in the US, Europe, Brazil, Argentina, Peru Panama and Mexico, 1stWEST M&A is uniquely positioned to serve its clients around the globe.

For more information about 1stWEST Mergers & Acquisitions LLC, please visit our website at www.1stwestma.com. To contact Joseph Lauderdale, please call (864) 631-6633 or email him atjlauderdale@charter.net.

Is Mexico the New China?


By Keith Fitz-Gerald, Chief Investment Strategist, Money Morning
Editor's Note:Money Morning Chief Investment Strategist Keith Fitz-Gerald's new book is - "Fiscal Hangover"


When it comes to global manufacturing, Mexico is quickly emerging as the “new” China.

According to corporate consultant Alix Partners, Mexico has leapfrogged China to be ranked as the cheapest country in the world for companies looking to manufacture products for the U.S. market. India is now No. 2, followed by China and then Brazil. In fact, Mexico’s cost advantages and has become so cheap that even Chinese companies are moving there to capitalize on the trade advantages that come from geographic proximity.

The influx of Chinese manufacturers began early in the decade, as China-based firms in the cellular telephone, television, textile and automobile sectors began to establish maquiladora operations in Mexico. By 2005, there were 20-25 Chinese manufacturers operating in such Mexican states Chihuahua, Tamaulipas and Baja. The investments were generally small, but the operations had managed to create nearly 4,000 jobs, Enrique Castro Septien, president of the Consejo Nacional de la Industria Maquiladora de Exportacion (CNIME), told the SourceMex <http://ladb.unm.edu/sourcemex/>  news portal in a 2005 interview.

China’s push into Mexico became more concentrated, with China-based automakers Zhongxing Automobile Co <http://www.hktdc.com/info/mi/a/cbn/en/1X04M9DW/1/China-Business-News/Zhongxing-Auto-To-Tap-Into-U-S-Market-This-Year.htm> ., First Automotive Works <http://www.google.com/finance?cid=6538582>  (in partnership with Mexican retail/media heavyweight Grupo Salinas <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grupo_Salinas> ), Geely Automobile Holdings (PINK: GELYF <http://www.google.com/finance?q=PINK%3AGELYF> ) and ChangAn Automobile Group Co. Ltd <http://www.google.com/finance?q=chang+an+auto> . (the Chinese partner of Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F <http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AF> ) and Suzuki Motor Corp <http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3AF> .), all announced plans to place automaking factories <http://www.insideline.com/car-news/mexico-chinese-automaker-expanding-as-existing-automakers-struggle.html>  in Mexico.

Not all the plans would come to fruition. But Geely’s plan called for a three-phase project that would ultimately involve a $270 million investment and have a total annual capacity of 300,000 vehicles <http://autonews.gasgoo.com/auto-news/1007542/Geely-joins-China-auto-makers--move-to-Mexico.html> . ChangAn wants to churn out 50,000 vehicles a year. Both companies are taking these steps with the ultimate goal of selling cars to U.S. consumers.

Mexico’s allure as a production site that can serve the U.S. market isn’t limited to China-based suitors. U.S. companies are increasingly realizing that Mexico is a better option than China. Analysts are calling it “nearshoring” or “reverse globalization.” But the reality is this: With wages on the rise in China, ongoing worries about whipsaw energy and commodity prices, and a dollar-yuan relationship that’s destined to get much uglier before it has a chance of improving, manufacturers with an eye on the American market are increasingly realizing that Mexico trumps China in virtually every equation the producers run.

“China was like a recent graduate, hitting the job market for the first time and willing to work for next to nothing,” Mexico-manufacturing consultant German Dominguez told the Christian Science Monitor in an interview last year. But now China is experiencing “the perfect storm … it’s making Mexico – a country that had been the ugly duckling when it came to costs – look a lot better <http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0911/p01s02-woam.html> .”

The real eye opener was a 2008 speculative frenzy that sent crude oil prices up to a record level in excess of $147 a barrel – an escalation that caused shipping prices to soar. Suddenly, the labor cost advantage China enjoyed wasn’t enough to overcome the costs of shipping finished goods thousands of miles from Asia to North America. And that reality kick-started the concept of “nearshoring,” concluded an investment research report by Canadian investment bank CIBC World Markets Inc <http://www.google.com/finance?cid=10995405> . (NYSE: CM <http://www.google.com/finance?q=NYSE%3ACM> )

“In a world of triple-digit oil prices, distance costs money,” the CIBC research analysts wrote. “And while trade liberalization and technology may have flattened the world, rising transport prices will once again make it rounder.”

Indeed, four factors are at work here.

Mexico’s “Fab Four”