EQUIPMENT
60
international
construction
july-august 2014
TEREX
now. They know what they’re doing
and they have big enough fleets to
support a major project. They can
come in with 300 machines.
“The used equipment market
is going to develop, and that
supports the availability of
affordable products. Finance is out
there. Rates are affordable – that’s
important – in Germany many
years ago there were plenty of
platforms available but the rates
were too high. Now in China the
rates are down to a point where the
fleet owners don’t like it.
“The other part is efficiency
and productivity – timelines on
projects. We have had several
projects with a couple of hundred
units on them. You seem to reach
a point where contractors go onto
another project and they want to
use aerials because of their previous
success. You also have clients that
not only want productivity, but also
demand safety.”
“Changing ownership patterns
are important. China used to be an
ownership culture, but now they
understand that you can rent it.”
The maturing Chinese market
has had an impact on the machines
Terex has chosen to build in
Changzhou. Although it is the only
Genie plant in the world that now
makes big booms for shipyards,
the volume is coming from scissor
lifts, with eight coming off the
production line each day for sale in
Asia-Pacific.
Sophistication
But the company has learned a
few lessons along the way. Some of
the early products to come out of
Changzhou were under the Skysafe
marque, including a low technology
machines such as a push-around
scissor lift and non-rotating boom
lift. They are not machines it makes
today.
“The Skysafe products were an
opportunity for us to go out and
focus on the very low end of the
market against ladders, scaffolding
and even ropes. So we wanted to
see if we built a very simple, de-
featured product, was there a real
clamour for that?
“We found the Chinese market is
much more sophisticated than that.
If they were going to spend money
on an aerial platform, they wanted
something that has more to it in
terms of value and features.
The Changzhou factory.
marmomacc.com
Verona, ITALY
24
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27 SEPTEMBER 2014
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