Volvo impact?

As Has Been Widely Publicised, Volvo Has Just Reached Financial Close On Its acquisition of Ingersoll Rand's road building equipment businesses. Although this business sat within Ingersoll Rand's Construction Technologies division – alongside, rather then integrated with Bobcat – there was some overlap between the two.

Construction Technologies products, including some of the smaller rollers were marketed as Bobcat machines, and Bobcat supplied its sister company with compact equipment for sale under Ingersoll Rand's livery. So what does the sale of the road building equipment business mean for Bobcat?

Mr Pedtke said, “We did partner very closely with our Construction Technologies division with some shared outlets, and we marketed some of their products through our Bobcat channel. But the products we focused on most were the utility type machines that stay with Ingersoll Rand – lighting towers and generators. In fact the amount of road building equipment that's going to Volvo is not really significant at all in terms of Bobcat dealers.”

“You'd have to say the road construction business fits in nicely for Volvo. From our point of view, with our chairman's desire to be a diversified industrial with a no.1 position in the industries we serve, Bobcat fits that, but road building does not. It was not a primary market leader in the way Bobcat is or our other brands like Thermo King are.”