At the 2026 AHR Expo in Las Vegas, John Reutter, president of building solutions – North American for Uponor, jokingly called 2024 the honeymoon year and 2025 the “mini-van year,” but ultimately characterized the union as fruitful, such as introducing ChlorFIT CPVC system. 

“OneGF is about expanding our offering, bringing sustainable, reliable system solutions — efficient systems — to our customers … not just within the building side, but with the industrial side, within the infrastructure side,” he said.

Despite the joined companies navigating a tough market, Reutter said they’re experiencing double-digit growth in areas like the CPVC line. As part of the Uponor Prefabrication Services offering, GF announced the Uponor Prefabricated PEX Water Risers for use in domestic water and hydronic distribution piping systems in commercial construction projects. 

PREFAB EFFICIENCY Uponor Prefabricated PEX Water Risers aim to maximize labor with fabricated assemblies and just-in-time shipments. (Courtesy of Uponor)

Uponor Prefabricated PEX Water Risers combine design assistance, fabricated assemblies, and just-in-time shipments to meet construction schedules, helping projects stay on budget and on track. 

“The short-term is going to be leveraging the portfolio of products that are already out there,” Reutter said. 

In the longer term, Reutters said he anticipates more innovations emerging from the combined teams, including products in growing areas like data centers and life sciences. 

“We are plumbing distribution, and they’re more project, right? There’s the push-pull that’s put there, big relationships we have at the contractor level, right? And we’re continuing to mature at the project level as we get into … more commercial work,” Reutter said. 

Max Holloway, head of GF Piping Systems USA industrial groups, Americas, said the two companies complement one another thanks to Uponor’s capabilities in design, distribution, and estimating, while GF provides a strong footprint of fabrication that spans 18 different sites across the globe. 

He emphasized that the long-term benefit of the acquisition will be the innovations they’ll bring to the commercial and industrial business sectors, thanks to the expanded resources available for R&D and engineering. 

“The market has headwinds, but to be honest, there’s a lot of things that we’ve been able to partner with some of our customers to really help them accelerate that construction, that development outside as well,” he said. 

Both Reutter and Holloway noted the culture fit has been complementary as well, noting they haven’t fallen victim to the “culture kills strategy” adage. 

“The teams worked very closely from day one,” Reutter said. “We have our businesses back in Europe, but they’ve given us the freedom … just to get after it, and they’ve given us that leeway.”