The big West Coast engineering firm, founded in Eureka and grown to expand all around the West Coast and Pacific Rim, has been acquired by the Australian firm GHD.

The North Bay Business Journal and the Santa Rosa Press-Democrat have stories.

UPDATE, 2:30 p.m.: Winzler & Kelly press release follows:

Winzler & Kelly announced today that it has merged with GHD (www.ghd.com), a leading engineering, architecture, and environmental consulting company with 6,000 employees serving clients from over 100 offices around the globe.

Iver Skavdal, CEO of Winzler & Kelly says “This merger benefits both of our firms. It allows us to offer increased innovation and efficiency to our clients and more professional development opportunities for our staff through a network of global resources, while also strengthening GHD’s offering in the Americas. We look forward to remaining a local business while providing a global network of resources to our clients and the communities we serve.”

“Winzler & Kelly brings us a tremendous talent pool that augments our superb East Coast operations in the USA. By joining with an established West Coast operation, GHD has expanded our service offering across the US, thus achieving a significant step in our growth strategy in the Americas. With this merger, GHD now offers over 70 services to clients in the water, energy & resources, environment, property & buildings, and transportation markets across the entire United States.” says Ian Shepherd, CEO of GHD.

Richard Wankmuller, GHD’s executive in charge of the Americas says, “With Winzler & Kelly’s great experience and capabilities comes great people. Their leadership team includes some of the best leaders I have worked with throughout the world and they augment the fantastic leadership we already have in place at GHD. The firm has been perennially recognized for excellence and innovation, most recently for the Middle Harbor Restoration Project at the Port of Oakland and the City of Santa Rosa’s sustainably designed Utilities Field Office campus. I am confident that Winzler & Kelly’s clients can look forward to the same high quality local service, with the support of global technical resources available through GHD’s highly collaborative network of talented staff.”

GHD is an international network of engineers, architects and environmental scientists that thinks beyond tomorrow to anticipate future challenges. Winzler & Kelly is an Engineering News Record Top 500 firm emphasizing sustainable design, value engineered solutions and innovation.