The Chapter 11 petition states that Lewis has assets and liabilities both exceeding USD100m, and that its debts are primarily business debts.
The Chapter 11 filing also states that Lewis “estimates that funds will be available for distribution to unsecured creditors”.
A list of 20 creditors holding the largest unsecured claims has also been released and includes Frost National Bank, with a claim to USD18.5m; FCC Equipment Financing, with a cliam to USD17.5m; Jake’s Crane, Rigging and Transport International, with a claim to USD1.3m; Sierra Equipment, with a claim to USD483,121 and Remote Dynamics, with a claim to USD31,837.
Under the US Bankruptcy Code, a Chapter 11 debtor usually proposes a plan of reorganisation to keep its business alive and pay creditors over time, according to the US Courts’ website. A Chapter 11 filing is also known as reorganisation bankruptcy.
Lewis specialises in tower, mobile and crawler cranes as well as rigging equipment, and is the exclusive North American dealer for SunCrane modular flat-top tower cranes and Zoomlion truck, crawler and all terrain cranes.
It acquired Verticon’s New Zealand tower crane and hoist assets for around USD12m at the end of 2007, and began importing Fushun Yongmao tower cranes to the US, under the SunCrane brand name, during 2008.
