Hanson completes acquisition of Material Service.

Hanson completes acquisition of Material Service, a major US aggregates producer, for $300 million (approximately £160m)

Hanson PLC, the international building materials company, announced today that it has completed the acquisition of Material Service Corporation (‘Material Service’) from General Dynamics Corporation (NYSE GD) for $300 million (approximately £160m) in cash.

Agreement to acquire Material Service was announced on March 2, 2006. The acquisition is expected to be earnings enhancing for Hanson in the first full year of ownership and will be financed from existing resources.

Material Service is the thirteenth largest producer of aggregates in the United States and will be managed within Hanson Aggregates North America. Employing more than 800 people in Illinois and western Indiana, it sold over 20 million US tons of aggregates in 2005 and is estimated to have approximately 1.5 billion tons of aggregate reserves. Material Service was established in 1919 by the Crown family and Mr Lester Crown will remain in his current capacity as Chairman of Material Service.

Alan Murray, Chief Executive of Hanson PLC, said: "We are pleased to have completed this transaction and are delighted Lester Crown has agreed to remain as Chairman. Since becoming a focused heavy building materials group in 1997, we have invested around US$2.5 billion on over 50 bolt-on acquisitions in North America. Material Service is the largest of these US dollar transactions and reinforces our position as one of the leading aggregates producers in the USA."

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Hanson PLC 
Nick Swift / Hilary Reid Evans 
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