New Holland Agriculture dealers will have access to a wider portfolio of hay tools, tillage machinery and forage feeders once CNH Industrial completes its acquisition of Kongskilde’s product, brand and manufacturing assets.

The Danish manufacturer, whose grain handling and industrial conveying divisions are not included in the deal, produces grass mowers, tedders, rakes, tractor-powered forage choppers and a line of mobile cattle mixer-feeders in a newly refurbished factory in Poland.

The Kongskilde tillage line includes moldboard plows built in Sweden, powered tillage implements, grain drills, precision planters and rock collectors also built in Europe. Its large scale air seeders, tillage implements and fertilizer placement machinery is produced in the group’s newly expanded North American plant in Hudson, Ill.

CNH Industrial CEO Richard Tobin said, “We are proud to welcome the well established products and brands of Kongskilde, Overum and JF into the CNH Industrial group. It is our intention to build upon the proud heritage of these brands and significantly increase their market access as part of our worldwide distribution network.”

With the exception of the U.S.-built product lines, Kongskilde’s portfolio mainly sells into markets within Europe and to Australia and New Zealand. The current dealer and importer network will remain unchanged for now, but the products will gradually be assimilated into the New Holland Agriculture range, says Carlo Lambro, New Holland brand president.

“The acquisition of the tillage, seeding and hay and for¬age activities of Kongskilde adds a key product range that will further broaden New Holland Agriculture’s offering within the agricultural sector,” he says. “This agreement will provide growth opportunities and create a strong platform to develop the Kongskilde business and its brands, and we will also gradually integrate their products into the New Holland portfolio.”

Having grown through a number of acquisitions in the 1990s, Kongskilde Industries struggled to maintain profit¬ability. DLG, a large farmer-owned cooperative in Denmark, took a controlling stake in the business in 2007 and sanc-tioned further acquisitions — including Illinois-based Progressive Farm Products in 2010.

A year later, DLG rescued JF-Stoll, another financially troubled Danish manufacturer, and merged its hay and feeder operations into Kongskilde Industries with a view to create a balanced product portfolio.

But the group continued to struggle and investments designed to streamline Kongskilde’s assets and a new one-brand policy prepared the business for sale after a substan¬tial loss at Kongskilde in 2013 caused DLG to miss its profit target and take a substantial financial hit in write-downs and restructuring expenses.

For the Danish cooperative, the deal with CNH Industrial removes a business that accounted for less than 1.5% of group sales but impacted group profits and occupied a great deal of management time.

For New Holland, it realizes an ambition to become a true full-liner in both Europe and North America, having been outbid by Kubota in 2012 for the Kverneland Group, which would have provided a similar range of products.