Rental company A-Plant has placed an order for more than 1,200 machines and a range of generators worth more than £55m. The order includes more than 600 JCB Loadall telescopic handlers and more than 450 mini and midi excavators, as well as JCB rough-terrain forklift trucks, site dumpers, backhoe loaders and tracked excavators.

The deal is good news for JCB’s factories in Rocester, Uttoxeter and Cheadle, as well as Hixon, Staffordshire-based JCB Power Products, which is manufacturing a total of 162 generators ordered by A-Plant following its first-ever purchase of JCB units last year. The volume of generators bought is enough to power eight hospitals or 4,000 homes. They will all be fitted with JCB’s LiveLink telematics system as standard and will be available through A-Plant’s Mather & Stuart Power Solutions division.

It means that in the last three years A-Plant has placed orders with JCB worth more than £140m. All the latest purchases are being supplied through JCB dealer Greenshields JCB.

The equipment will be distributed throughout A-Plant’s network of over 175 service centres. A-Plant’s marketing director Asif Latief said: “The latest products are more innovative, productive, safer, greener and more sustainable. We are delighted to have placed this latest order with JCB, which demonstrates our commitment to working with leading brands. It is part of our continual fleet investment programme which has seen the plant hire company invest over £300 million during the last two years.”