The crane market in Oceania has gone through a difficult period. But Julian Champkin found an atmosphere of expectation and refusal to yield.

It has been almost two years since the last time a car was produced in Australia. Holden, a local manufacturer, has made the iconic Ute, the utility vehicle — the family in the first half and the pickup truck with the shepherd dog in the second — has become a brand of General Motors. It closed its production line in October 2017.

"Toyota and Ford have left," said Colin Smith, managing director of JDN Monocrane, a Victoria-based crane and crane designer and manufacturer. "Mitsubishi had withdrawn a few years before that. Now all cars in Australia are imported."

These automakers all believe that labor costs in Australia are too high, and the consumer markets in Australia and New Zealand are too small to maintain production there.

"It left a hole," said Bruce McKay, director of Global Track Australia, who makes lightweight gantry cranes. "But there is nothing to fill the hole. Holden's work has been almost vacant for two years."

The car is connected to the crane. The automotive industry can usually be used as an indicator of manufacturing; on the surface, large-scale exodus is not an encouraging history for any type of factory crane and lifting equipment supplier.

James Schmidt is an engineering manager at Sam Technology, a manufacturer of materials handling and lifting equipment. "Australian manufacturing is dead," he said. "In Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane, management fees and land costs are very high. The government discourages manufacturing. The rest is infrastructure and mining. As a crane manufacturer, you can pass the customs. Otherwise, you are... …" We can end his sentence politely and say, "...I’m in trouble."

Although even crane manufacturers in the infrastructure and mining industries have problems. "The mining industry has also been dead for six or seven years," said Philip Heinrichson of crane manufacturer Eilbeck Cranes. "It's starting to start again, but there are Australians who want to ban mining." Among other things, he was referring to the controversy over the new giant Adani open-pit coal mine in Queensland, which split the country before obtaining government permission.

Schmidt of Sam Technology issued the final doomsday warning to crane manufacturers. "There is a small place called China," he said. And China, relatively speaking, is on the road.

Heinrichsen can use numbers to express'relatively speaking': "We are two weeks away from China in Australia. In Europe, you are six weeks. So we are their first choice."

Bruce McKay is the director of Global Track Australia, which manufactures light gantry cranes. "One of my customers recently bought three jib cranes from China," he said. "He told me the price; it's about half of what is made locally. The good news is that tariffs are imposed on imported goods, which will have some impact."

Eilbeck, Sam Technologies, JDN and Global Track are Australian companies with a proud Australian heritage. With Australia’s high labor costs and the cheap and potentially pleasant cranes at their doorstep, how do these companies survive?

"Diversity," Sam's Schmidt said. "We are very busy because we also make other things. In the crane market, we make special-purpose machines. We leave standard things to others." For Sam, the added value lies in custom structures to cope with the inability of ready-made products. Provide the situation.

Al Baker took another approach. What they supply is not experts, but the quality side of the market. As the sole importer and distributor of ABUS cranes from Germany, they sell with German engineering technology and Australia's self-reliance and pride. "Our company has a 17% market share," Heinrichsen said. "We are the largest ABUS agent outside of Germany. And we have many customers. The premium market still exists. If we are not here, those who buy from us will not buy cheap Chinese: the good things they want No matter who produces it, it’s not cheap. All equipment has suitability and purpose, you need to pay for what you get. Temporary backyard operators will buy Chinese, but in any case he is not our natural customer. The high-quality market is still exist."

The same is true of local pride. "Our hearts are still country folks, and we are still an island; this means that people like to trade locally. The real guys still support us."

Eurocrane, headquartered in Melbourne, is another importer and distributor that specializes in Verlinde cranes from France. Geoffrey Wiart, their technical sales manager, has also entered the same field: “The mining industry is indeed very stable, even if it hasn’t slowed down,” he said. "They are not our customers, but looking for cheap (ie Asian) disposable cranes. We focus on quality rather than quantity. I'm not sure if the mining industry will grow soon, but considering the recent Iranian incidents and global wars The fear of China, as well as the increase in gold prices and demand caused by rare earths, electric vehicles and IT, is likely to continue."

"In terms of technology, Australian customers are generally willing to invest more in suitable equipment," Wiart said. "For them, this is not getting the cheapest crane. Even so, there is still very little demand for automation or anti-sway systems. We do occasionally need technically challenging cranes from the aviation and nuclear industries, as well as from the air force and defense. We started to be called the company, it said "we will do", and others said "this is too complicated." We usually focus on special cranes."

JDN produces AH, the Australian crane, and Colin Smith is proud to tell you that it has 2.6 million models. "That's because it is modular," he said. "Customers can choose their options. Once you combine speed, drum size, winding combinations, etc., it's like the action in a chess game: several different Actions can produce thousands of different results. I am not saying that we have made every one of these 2 million possible combinations. But it is a large range.

"When the auto industry is over, we sit down and calculate the numbers," he said. "We thought'this will hurt.' We were so wrong. This gap has been completely filled by other industries."

He can explain this obvious paradox. "The reality is that the domestic auto industry is the least localized in history. We are not a car manufacturer, we are part of the global car assembly area. When it ended, all sub-manufacturers insisted on supplying parts locally."

"Australia has a more'small business' market," Eurocranes' Wiart said. "In recent years, most of the heavy manufacturing industry has moved from Australia, but its isolation has caused Australians to rely on their own large number of small manufacturing industries to keep crane manufacturers busy." He echoed the theme of the "island mentality": "Remember, The time it takes to get from Melbourne to Perth is as long as the time it takes for a Londoner to go to Egypt."

Colin Smith of JDN said again: "The economy was pretty strong just now. Interest rates are falling and they are trying to get more inflation into the system; the Australian dollar is falling, which helps our exports. So this makes our position a bit strange. We still build a lot of cranes here."

Heinrichson of Eilbeck agrees fundamentally: “The market is strong in terms of infrastructure and construction. The mining industry is ready to start again.”

Bruce McKay is the director of Global Track Australia, which manufactures light gantry cranes. The company has been established for 15 years. He recently participated in a trade fair. "It gave me 60 inquiries to follow up. I usually get 30. I haven't seen so much interest since 2012. There is still a lot of work to be done to translate inquiries into sales, but based on experience, I found that about 20% of queries become sales, which means that if so, we will have 12 jobs. Maybe the industry is struggling now, but I would say that the market is stable. It will not decline because there are solutions Many crane companies in the area are doing well. I am a small business, so I feel a lot of pressure, but my instinct is that things are starting to change." He saw areas of growth. "Wind farms have potential," he said. "There will be special lifting equipment for these people. They call it'Golden Wind'. This is a growing opportunity." Australia has sunshine — a lot. "There are some large solar farms. Renewable energy is now being established."

For Eurocranes, it is mainly electricity, natural gas and water companies that drive its business. "It is difficult for them to find a supplier that can truly cover and comply with all relevant standards, and we have earned a good reputation for being able to follow these standards and provide quality products," Wiart said. "The manufacturing industry is not far behind. The mining industry only obtains spare parts or small equipment from us."

As we said before, infrastructure is another pillar. Modular cranes mainly work in Victoria. "There have been ups and downs, but some projects-mainly roads and tunnels-are now nearby," said their Agatha Loizu. "They are increasing, so overhead cranes etc. are needed. Last year was good."

Australia has always been a land of immigrants, and this situation continues:

"Although the global crisis started in 2008, the constant influx of immigrants continues to maintain high demand for infrastructure and growing demand, which drives economic development," Wiart said. “In Victoria alone, the government spends a lot of money on infrastructure.” The Melbourne Metro Tunnel project cost 11 billion Australian dollars. The West Gate Tunnel cost A$6.8 billion, the Melbourne Airport Rail Link cost A$5 billion, and the M80 Ring Road upgrade cost A$2.2 billion. The A$9.3 billion Melbourne-Brisbane Inland Railway is funded by the state. There are also subway projects elsewhere in Sydney, this time worth 12 billion Australian dollars; Queensland has a 5.4 billion Australian dollars cross-river railway, and this list can add 6 more. As McKay said before, there are workarounds.

Outside of large projects, the business is fairly stable. Wiart said: “Small companies are being created every day. Existing customers will upgrade their equipment without hesitation if needed.” Eurocranes is Verlinde’s agent and one of its specialties is Entertainment crane; Wiart said that entertainment is a business that continues to be in high demand. "It is the only stable industry; with the implementation of the D8+ standard, many of our competitors have found themselves excluded."

There are still problems with Australian standards. They are inconsistent with Europe or the United States. "The Australian standard is very similar to the FEM and ISO standards, but has its own twists and turns," he said. "They basically use the strictest foreign standards in some aspects and ignore others. It even varies from state to state. This is very confusing. Many foreign companies, even some other Verlinde agents, are trying to break into Australia. The market, but they lose money every time they find difficulties with standards and regulations."

Eurocrane is very lucky here, Wiart said: "Verlinde is very supportive in terms of standards. Many of their management teams actually set international standards and become board members. It lets them know what is going to happen, and they always follow the latest Standards. It gives us an advantage over the competition.

"Interestingly, if you dig deep enough in various standards, there is currently no motor in the world that really meets all the requirements..."

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