Manitowoc Crane Group’s transition to a factory-direct sales and distribution hub serving the Asia-Pacific region is now complete after concluding a transaction with Coastal Equipment, Manitowoc’s former distributor in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and China.
The organization, called Manitowoc Potain Singapore PTE Ltd., consolidates the sales and service networks for Manitowoc’s crawler cranes and boom trucks, plus Potain’s tower cranes. The new subsidiary also will act as the regional headquarters for the Manitowoc Crane Group in the Asia Pacific region. Manitowoc Crane Group will use the Potain subsidiaries in China, the Philippines and Australia to market crawler cranes and will retain the successful distributors of Potain and Manitowoc in the other countries. Manitowoc’s office in Korea will now sell and support the tower crane product line.
The new organization is based in the former Coastal Equipment facility in Singapore. Under the agreement, Manitowoc has acquired the assets and inventories of Coastal Equipment and retained several former key Coastal service and parts personnel. The continuity of staff will allow for uninterrupted service and support in the territories previously covered by Coastal Equipment, strengthened by the addition of two factory engineers from Manitowoc to provide sales and service support.
Manitowoc Crane Group’s reorganization in the Asia-Pacific region was undertaken to ensure that the experienced Manitowoc and Potain organizations could serve customers directly and provide world-class service and support. All employees of the new organization moved into the new offices Oct. 1.
Manitowoc Potain’s facilities in Singapore will offer comprehensive crane sales and support. The facilities include a 30,138-sq.-ft. (2,800 sq m) shop, storage for parts and boom, a training school, a full library of repair and product manuals plus administrative offices. Future plans include a remanufacturing program for used crawler cranes.
Key administrators of the Asia-Pacific office include:
• Eric Etchart, managing director
• Jari Tuorilla, sales director, crawler cranes
• Eric Blanchard, sales regional manager
• Noel Brennan, sales regional manager
• Brian Kerscher, product support director
• Pierre Lespinasse, service manager
• Sally Lim, parts manager
• Albert Lim, parts manager.
