Ireland: Kingspan has agreed to acquire electrical engineering firm BMC Manufacturing Group for €850m, comprising €600m in cash and €250m in new shares. BMC Manufacturing Group designs and produces low-voltage power distribution equipment for data centres at four plants in Dublin and County Meath, with a fifth planned somewhere in the US. Kingspan already supplies insulation and other construction products to data centres. The Irish Times newspaper has reported that the Kingspan expects to complete the acquisition by the end of 2026.

Uzbekistan: Representatives of China-based Wonderful International Investment Group attended a meeting with the government of Toshkent region on 4 August 2026. Trend News has reported that the parties discussed the producer’s plans for an insulation panel plant in Nurafshon. Governor Zoyir Mirzayev reportedly laid out possible incentives and conditions for foreign investment in the region. Following the conclusion of the meeting, Mirzayev showed delegates potential sites for the eventual plant.

UK: Alternative insulation developer Wull Technologies, a joint venture of Vector Labs and Wool Insulation Wales, has obtained €87,700 in prize money, after commercial director Ruth-Marie Mackrodt was named among 61 winners at Innovate UK’s 10th Women in Innovation Awards for 2025/26. The funding will go towards scale-up, independent testing and product demonstrations of Wull Technologies’ LAMDA brand sheep wool insulation panels over the coming 12 months.

The grant follows a €351,000 investment from the Greater Manchester Advance Fund and the University of Manchester Innovation Factory in 2025. Mackrodt co-founded Wool Insulation Wales in 2022.

Croatia: Knauf Insulation has commissioned a new €120m, 60,000t/yr-capacity electric melting line for stone wool production at its Novi Marof insulation plant. The line is equipped with a submerged arc furnace and is capable of using up to 50% recycled raw material.

Technical director Leon Bustin said "This will add a selection of lower-embodied-carbon rock mineral wool products available to our customers, for applications such as flat roofs and sandwich panel boards."