Skyjack invests in Chinese operations

Skyjack is investing in its Chinese operation and aims to establish several locations for stocking parts and machines in the near future.

The company already has an office in Shanghai and a separate workshop in the city, but a spokesman for the company told Access International that a new, consolidated facility in Shanghai will be opened soon.

Skyjack will leverage the Chinese presence of its parent company, Linamar, which has a production plant at Wuxi, west of Shanghai, and another under development in Tianjin. Skyjack hopes to stock machines at both of these locations.

The spokesman, talking to AI on the opening day of the BICES exhibition in Beijing, would not confirm if either of these Linamar plants would be used to produce aerial platforms, although that would be an obvious next step. JLG, Haulotte, Terex AWP and Aichi are among foreign manufacturers that already have plants in China.

The China investment is part of a wider globalisation project for Skyjack. In recent months it has opened a new facility in Australia and it is also investing in its Brazil operation.

Meanwhile, Charlie Patterson, Skyjack's managing director for Europe, Africa and Middle East operations, has also taken on board responsibility for Asia Pacific.