The Governor of the Kaluga Region Anatoly Artamonov; the president of Volvo Construction Equipment Pat Olney, and the head of
The new plant is being built in Kaluga, 150 km south-west of Moscow, and will be Volvo’s seventh excavator manufacturing facility (of a total of 16 plants globally). Building work has begun on the 15hectare plot and, when completed, the final manufacturing area will be 20,660m2.
Six models of excavators are planned to be made at the plan ranging from the 20tonne EC200 to the 48tonne EC480. The first machines are due off the assembly lines next year, creating 280 new jobs in the process.
“This is a considerable investment and underscores Volvo’s confidence in, and commitment to, the Russian economy,” said Olney. “Excavators are a key product in this rapidly developing market. This investment also demonstrates our strategy of, where possible, manufacturing goods close to where our customers are located.”
Volvo CE plans to double sales in Russia by 2015, and it says excavator manufacturing in Kaluga will play an important role in achieving this goal. It also plans to develop the distribution network, and says that new Russian dealer Ferronordic Machines has an ambitious investment and expansion programme, one that will see numbers of branches swell to approximately 100 locations by 2015 (up from today’s 55) and head count more than double to around 1,000 people in the same time span.
