Kobelco Construction Machinery America Llc, a manufacturer of compact, mid-size and full-size excavators, last week announced that it is investing approximately $10.5 million in its Calhoun, Ga., operations. Five million dollars has been appropriated for production expansion into a new 52,000-square-foot building while an additional $1.5 million will be used to develop a new training center. A $4-million upgrade in production machinery is also just being completed at the existing Calhoun location.
The investments will allow the company to consolidate training operations, expand production capacity by approximately 15 percent and increase exports to about a third of its total production. The new training center will provide a facility for sales and service training for dealers and company personnel and will employ a full-time technical support staff.
“All Kobelco machines are manufactured in our own plants to ensure continuous excellence in quality, and our global manufacturing footprint allows us to maintain specialized manufacturing centers of excellence in close proximity to customers, wherever they are in the world,” said Terry Sheehan, president and CEO of Kobelco America. “Timely delivery of quality products to our customers requires continued investments in the production processes for best-in-class manufacturing activities, which is exactly what we are committed to.”
The Calhoun facility has been manufacturing Kobelco machines since 1990 and has produced more than 22,000 excavators. The plant also manufactures excavators and dozers for the New Holland Construction brand.
Kobelco Construction Machinery America, a joint venture company owned by CNH Global N.V., which is a majority-owned subsidiary of Fiat S.p.A., and Kobelco Construction Machinery USA, manufactures and markets a full line of compact, mid-size and full-size excavators ranging from 1.9 to 88 tons.
