JCB is preparing to open its new $1 billion manufacturing plant in San Antonio, Texas, next month while a £100 million modernisation programme continues at its headquarters in Staffordshire.
The one-million-square-foot San Antonio factory will be JCB’s largest production site and is intended to create 1,500 jobs over the next five years. Initial production will include Loadall telescopic handlers and access equipment for the North American market, adding capacity inside one of the manufacturer’s largest regional construction equipment markets.
The Texas opening is the current production milestone in JCB’s latest update. Its £100 million Staffordshire programme was originally announced in October 2025 and is already under way, so the British investment forms part of continuing factory modernisation rather than a new capital commitment.
At Rocester in Staffordshire, £60 million of the UK programme is being spent on a fully automated powder paint plant. The wider shopfloor modernisation includes new machining centres, friction welders, cylinder boring equipment, and associated production upgrades. The work is intended to improve manufacturing capability at a site that has been JCB’s headquarters since 1950 and remains central to its British production network.
San Antonio and Rocester address different manufacturing requirements. The Texas plant adds a new high-volume footprint close to North American customers, while Staffordshire is being re-equipped around an established factory system. One reduces the distance between production and a major market; the other uses automation and replacement machinery to extend the capability of an existing manufacturing base.
JCB currently operates 23 factories and employs more than 20,000 people worldwide, including more than 8,000 in the UK. Its latest financial figures show 2025 turnover of £5.7 billion and profit before tax of £642 million, with 113,498 machines sold during the year. Machine volumes were around 5% lower, while the company described North American demand as flat and said the Indian market contracted by 12%.
Additional capacity is therefore arriving without an across-the-board construction equipment boom. JCB says it nevertheless increased global market share during 2025 and expects moderate growth in 2026. San Antonio provides production headroom if North American demand strengthens, while the Staffordshire programme focuses on productivity, process modernisation, and retaining manufacturing capability in Britain.
The investment cycle extends beyond buildings and conventional machinery. Hydrogen combustion engines are now in production following a separate £100 million JCB development programme, with engines manufactured at Foston in Derbyshire. Two production-based units were used in the Hydromax vehicle that reached 406.320mph at the Bonneville Salt Flats in August, demonstrating engineering developed for the less theatrical task of powering working machinery without conventional diesel combustion.
Hydrogen engines do not remove the infrastructure and fuel supply questions surrounding hydrogen use in off-highway equipment, but moving them into production adds another manufacturing requirement to JCB’s UK operations. Engine assembly, machining, controls, validation, and service support have to develop alongside the machines that will eventually use the technology.
Skills remain part of the capacity equation. JCB says 116 apprentices, undergraduates, and graduates joined the business this month after more than 6,300 applications, while its engineering academy received 708 applications for 314 available places this year. Automated plant reduces manual intervention in some processes, but equipment manufacturers still need engineers, maintenance specialists, production technicians, programmers, and quality staff capable of keeping complex manufacturing systems operating reliably.
Bringing more North American production into Texas also changes the logistics around JCB’s regional growth. Machines built closer to customers can reduce dependence on transatlantic production flows for the models assigned to San Antonio, while local manufacturing creates its own requirements for suppliers, inventory, service parts, and workforce development. The factory’s eventual product mix will determine how far those effects extend across JCB’s wider network.
The latest company update also brings the first change at the top of JCB in more than 50 years, with George Bamford becoming joint chairman alongside Lord Bamford. The leadership change coincides with a manufacturing cycle spanning British plant modernisation, hydrogen powertrain development, and the company’s largest production facility anywhere in the world.
When San Antonio opens, JCB will have converted a long-running US expansion programme into operating manufacturing capacity while the Staffordshire work continues in parallel. The next useful indicators will be production ramp-up in Texas, installation and commissioning of the new British equipment, and whether the additional capacity is matched by the moderate market growth the company expects during 2026.
