The Hudiksvall centre will contribute to the technical development of Hiab product lines, including its truck mounted-forklifts.

Hiab, which is part of Cargotec, will invest nearly EUR2 million (USD2.7 million) in its product development and test centre in Hudiksvall, Sweden.

"For 70 years, Hiab has been the world's leading provider of on-road load-handling equipment," says Gert Larsson, Hiab's executive vice president for products. "Product development is one of our focus areas and the decision to invest in it is strategically important in order to guarantee our future technological competitiveness."

The product development and test centre will contribute to technical development across several product lines, including truck-mounted forklifts; support Hiab's global network of product development units with testing and verification; and also manage the collaboration with external partners.

Stefan Onkenhout, Hiab's R&D director for loader cranes, adds: "We will further increase the high level of our expertise in applied research and will utilise Hudiksvall to host meetings when we work together with universities and external partners. We will also expand our capacity in new product development to be able to accelerate our processes and launch innovative new technology on the market faster."

The enhanced centre is expected to be ready in 2015.

Hiab has product development units in China, Finland, Ireland, Poland, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Separately, Hiab has completed employee co-operation negotiations in Hudiksvall. The company announced in February that the assembly operations for loader cranes, recycling cranes and forestry cranes in Hudiksvall would cease gradually by the first quarter of 2015.

As a result of the negotiations, 134 employees were affected. As previously announced, 16 employees will be transferred to IBE Spectrum AB to whom Hiab sold its paint shop operation in Hudiksvall in May (Forkliftaction.com #666).

The restructuring measures are expected to result in annual cost savings of approximately
EUR11 million (USD15 million) with full effect from the year 2016, and generate restructuring costs of approximately EUR14 million (USD19 million), of which EUR12 million (USD16.4 million) will be booked in Cargotec's second quarter financial results.

The focus of the current unit in Hudiksvall will shift from manufacturing to developing new products and testing products, as well as after-sales and spare parts support.