Kalmar sharpens its strategy with
the sale of cab manufacturer Velsa
Comments Kalmar CEO, Christer Granskog:
"The key to providing the best service to our customers involves staying close to them, developing and assembling good products and offering efficient services based on our knowledge of their needs. To allow Kalmar to increase its focus on this, we look for partners to work together with us in the supply chain. This set-up gives us greater volume flexibility to cope with both the upswings and downturns in our very cyclical business environment and enables us to better meet our customers’ demands."
Rautaruukki commitment to investing in component manufacturing is in line with its long-term business strategy, according to Markku Koljonen, President of Ruukki Engineering, Rautaruukki Corporation:
"We are fully committed to developing Velsa business and firmly believe we can deliver added value to Kalmar customers."
Kalmar belief in the importance of driver comfort and safety, and its subsequent commitment to fitting all of its machines with state-of-the-art cabins remains key to its position as a leading supplier of container handling equipment. As such, Velsa will continue to be the sole supplier to Kalmar factoriesin Europe following the transaction. Moreover, Kalmar will continue to involve Velsa in its research and development activities, which are key to the development of state-of-the-art products such as the ergonomic Spirit Delta cab.
Velsa is the leading Northern European manufacturer of mobile equipment cabins, which it supplies to, among others, Komatsu Forest, Sandvik-Tamrock and Dynapac. Its turnover for 2003 was EUR42 million. As of the end of August 2004, the company employed 396 people.
Notes to editors:
Press information can be found on Kalmar website www.kalmarind.com. Simply click on News Room to be taken to a list of recent press releases or on Press Pictures to be taken to the Kalmar photo gallery.
Kalmar is a global provider of heavy duty materials handling equipment and services to ports, intermodal traffic, terminals and demanding industrial customers. Kalmar focuses on supplying handling solutions that enable customers to operate with a high level of efficiency and reliability. Every fourth container or trailer transfer at terminals around the world is handled by a Kalmar machine.
Kalmar provides a large range of value added services such as maintenance contracts and fleet management. Manufacturing plants are situated in Sweden (as is the head office), in Finland, the Netherlands, Estonia, Malaysia, China and the USA.
For further information
aija.kalander@kalmarind.com