Konecranes

Organization

Stig Gustavson was the company's first CEO from 1994-2005 and has been Chairman Of the Board since 2005. The second CEO, Pekka Lundmark (2005-2015) joined KCI Konecranes in 2004, before that he worked e.g. for Hackman and Nokia. On April 2, 2015 he was nominated as the new CEO of Fortum. The current President and CEO is Panu Routila (2015-) who joined the company from Ahlström Capital where he had been President and CEO since 2008.

Group Executive Board

There are 6 members in Konecranes Group Executive Board.

1. Panu Routila, President and CEO
2. Teo Ottola, Chief Financial Officer, Deputy CEO
3. Fabio Fiorino, Executive Vice President, Business Area Service, Chief Customer Officer
4. Mikko Uhari, Executive Vice President, Strategy and Technology
5. Juha Pankakoski, Chief Digital Officer
6. Timo Leskinen, Senior Vice President, Human Resources

Business units

Konecranes has 11,900 employees at 600 locations in 48 countries. and it is arranged into two business divisions - Equipment and Service (covering crane maintenance, safety and machine tool service).

Equipment

Konecranes Equipment business division offers components, cranes, and material handling solutions for e.g. process industries, the nuclear sector, industries handling heavy loads, ports, inter-modal terminals, shipyards, and bulk material terminals. The business area offers products like industrial cranes, wire rope and chain hoists, crane components, workstation lifting systems, manual hoists, and medium to heavy forklifts.

Service

Konecranes Service business division offers maintenance and modernization services for industrial cranes, lifting equipment, and machine tools in 600 locations in 48 countries. It also has service products it like inspections, preventive maintenance programs, repairs and improvements, on-call service, spare parts and modernizations. There are almost 420,000 units under Konecranes maintenance contracts and one fourth of them was manufactured by Konecranes.

History

The company was initially a division of Finnish Kone company, who began to manufacture cranes and hoists in the 1930s, but was spun off as an independent company in 1994 when KONE underwent extensive restructuring.

Early years with KONE, from 1910 to 1994

Konecranes is a Corporate spin-off of Kone which was founded in 1910. But it was not until in 1933 when KONE Corporation started to build sizeable electric overhead traveling cranes mainly for the pulp and paper and power industry. Three years later it started to manufacture electric wire rope hoists.

In 1947 the company started to make harbor cranes and in the post-war economy the harbor cranes business line experienced strong growth. In the 1960s KCI Konecranes signed the first preventive maintenance contract with a customer.

In 1973 the company began to expand internationally and it bought Norwegian Wisbech-Refsum. In 1983 the company establishes R&M Materials Handling in Ohio, which was its first foothold in the USA and in 1986 the company acquired Verlinde from France. The organization was changed in 1988 and the crane operations were organized then into the KONE Cranes Division of KONE Corporation.

Lloyds British Testing (which had operations in the UK and Australia) was acquired in 1991 and so the company started its first office in the UK. During the same year a large restructuring program was launched. Because of it crane production facilities were cut from 19 to 4 by 1994.

KCI Konecranes, from 1994 to 2006

KCI Konecranes was formed on 15 April 1994, when KONE Corporation group made some radical changes before it was listed on the Helsinki Stock Exchange. KONE kept its elevator business and sold others, including the operations of its crane division. Two years later also KCI Konecranes was listed on the Helsinki Stock Exchange and has since that grown to become a constituent member of the benchmark OMX Helsinki 25 index.

In 1997, KCI Konecranes expanded into Germany by acquiring German MAN SWF Krantechnik. Later KCI Konecranes experienced high organic growth in Germany, and in 2000 it made several bolt-on acquisitions.

In 2002, KCI Konecranes made history in China: it was the first foreign crane company to receive a complete range of business licensees (including import and export). Also in Japan a milestone was achieved by establishing a joint venture agreement with Meidensha Corporation. After an acquisition of Swedish SMV Lifttrucks AB in 2004 reach stackers and lift trucks were added to the product range. A year later, KCI Konecranes acquired German R.STAHL AG's material handling division, R.Stahl Fördertechnik and the following year MMH Holdings, Inc.

Konecranes, from 2006 onwards

In 2006 KCI Konecranes launched a new refocused and unified global master brand strategy and identity, and the "KCI" was dropped from the brand name and the slogan "Lifting Businesses™" was introduced.

In 2007 all rights to German straddle carrier manufacturer Consens Transport Systeme GmbH's products were acquired and straddle carrier manufacturing was started. Other acquisitions included Norwegian Kongsberg Automation AS and Swedish Reftele Maskinservice AB.

In 2008 Konecranes wanted to increase its presence in the Japanese hoist market, and so it raised its share holding in Meiden Hoist System Company Ltd (MHS) from 49 to 65 percent. It also wanted to expand its activities in Spain so it acquired crane, hoist and service companies Eydimen 2000 S.L. and Ausió Sistemas de Elevación S.L. Other acquisitions of that year were made in Scandinavia and in the UK.

In 2009 Konecranes entered a new business segment—aluminum rail systems and manipulators—with two acquisitions. It also introduced an industrial crane, SMARTON®, which was said to be capable of reducing power consumption and energy cost by up to one third. Konecranes bought 65% of Sanma Crane manufacture Co. Ltd., one of the leading hoist and crane manufacturers in China.

In 2010 Konecranes announced six acquisitions related to Machine Tool Service (MTS) in Denmark, in the UK and in the USA. In 2011 Konecranes acquired WMI Cranes Ltd. (WMI) from India and Saudi Arabian crane manufacturer Saudi Cranes & Steel Works Factory Company Limited (“Saudi Cranes”).

In 2012 Konecranes introduced a hybrid power option for its RTGs (Rubber tyred gantry crane). With the help of new hybrid (diesel/electric) power sources for RTGs, diesel consumption at ports can be reduced by over 60 percent. The first electrified rubber-tyred gantry cranes (ERTG) in the United States were unveiled by the Georgia Ports Authority (GPA) in December 2012. The new technology reduces fuel consumption by an estimated 95 percent. The new ERTG system was developed with the help of Konecranes, Conductix-Wampfler and Georgia Power.

In 2013 Konecranes launched the world's first hybrid reach stacker for container handling. Its lifting capacity is 45 tons and it will cut fuel consumption by around 10 litres per hour. In March 2013 Konecranes launched a Remote Monitoring and Reporting tool, TRUCONNECT. It allows lift truck operators to track the usage, efficiency and productivity of their lift trucks through a remote connection. The data is transmitted wirelessly to the Konecranes Remote Data Center, where it is analysed and compiled in online views and reports, accessible 24/7 through a password-protected customer portal. In June 2013, Konecranes launched a new Automated RTG (ARTG) system. It copes with wide range of surface variations in RTG container yards. In November 2013, Konecranes developed an auto start-stop feature that turns off the lift truck engine when it idles for a period of time. This function helps reduce fuel consumption by 5-15% along with CO2 emissions.

Planned merger of equals with Terex

On 11 August 2015, Konecranes announced merger with US based Material Handling solutions company Terex. The merger was treated as "Merger of Equals". However, on 16 May 2016, Konecranes signed an agreement to acquire from Terex Corporation its Material Handling & Port Solutions segment against consideration consisting of cash and shares and to terminate the previously announced business combination agreement.

Acquisition of Terex's Material Handling and Port Solutions business

On 4 January 2017, Konecranes announced the completion of the acquisition of MHPS business from Terex Corporation.

Customers

Konecranes has customers all over the world. Some examples:

Awards