New Johannesburg distribution centre represents
Caterpillar has officially inaugurated its new parts distribution facility in Kempton Park, near Johannesburg, South Africa. The Johannesburg Distribution Centre (JDC) – a massive 60,000m² facility – consolidates two previous smaller parts distribution sites in Isando. The consolidation provides several advantages, including enabling the company to work more efficiently, while increasing the capability to provide greater parts availability to its customers in southern Africa.
Speaking at the official inauguration on Thursday, 31 August 2017, Rob Charter, Caterpillar group president, customer and dealer dupport, said Caterpillar’s investment in a new and more efficient parts distribution facility demonstrates its deep commitment to its customers in Africa. The investment is part of the previously announced plan of Caterpillar, its independent dealers and the Caterpillar Foundation to invest more than US$1 billion in countries throughout Africa over five years.
“This is just another illustration of what we want to bring to South Africa, which is not only about investing in physical assets, but first and foremost in people. We have also negotiated an Equity Equivalent Investment Programme with the South African Department of Trade and Industry, which is the largest programme of this type in South Africa,” said Charter.
“Bringing our parts distribution centre under one roof in South Africa and expanding our parts distribution capabilities clearly illustrate South Africa’s importance as a hub for our business in southern Africa. This will further improve our service to customers throughout the region,” added Chris Monge, District Manager for Southern Africa, based in Johannesburg.
The new JDC is Caterpillar’s largest parts facility in Africa, representing the OEM’s largest ever investment in physical assets on the continent. The new parts distribution centre holds over 110,000 different parts and components, and serves over 10,000 customers in 11 countries in the region.
This facility also represents another first for Caterpillar as it has a co-location arrangement with its southern African dealer, Barloworld Equipment. This arrangement is the first of its kind in the Caterpillar network. A 3,500m² portion of the facility hosts Barloworld Equipment’s retail parts operation and the dealer has since consolidated its over-the-counter aftermarket parts activities from its previous two parts facilities in Linbro Park and Isando into the new location.
Barloworld Equipment, Caterpillar’s dealer since 1927, is one of the OEM’s oldest dealers outside of North America. The two companies conducted a joint supply chain study uncovering multiple benefits of co-locating operations in a new site.
“We decided to take this approach after an extensive study. The benefits of the co-location include improved parts availability to customers as well as increased velocity in filling parts orders given the proximity of the dealer’s retail parts sales counter to the regional distribution centre,” says Bonnie Fetch, Caterpillar Director of Aftermarket Parts Distribution.
Caterpillar has over 35,000 active machines and engines operating throughout southern Africa, and Charter says to keep all those machines running smoothly, there is need to provide replacement parts as quickly as possible, but skills are as vital. To help people in Africa develop their technical skills, two years ago, Caterpillar launched an e-learning website called Technicians for Africa to support local skills development both in South Africa and 14 other African countries.
Technicians for Africa is a completely free online training programme that provides future technicians a base level of technical knowledge to make them viable candidates for careers as heavy equipment technicians and several other related fields. “We are very proud of this initiative, which is available in English, French and Portuguese. To date, we have over 700 registered users in South Africa and 3,500 in southern Africa,” concludes Charter.
