Hiab Loglift cranes in Karelia

Hiab equipment and Cargotec service meeting specific demands of a Russian-Finnish enterprise

In the previous issue, we told you about Cargotec’s experience on Russian market that combines severe
requirements of the climate and the trickiness of business relationships, so untypical for Europe.

It takes a great deal of bravery and intuition incorporated with strong experience and values, to enter this
market. And as a rule, significant market capacity ensures worthy profits.

One of Cargotec’s priorities is winning in emerging markets, including Russia. And Russian market is
incredibly diverse. Last time we took a brief glance at a few cases with purely Russian companies as
customers of Hiab machinery. Those companies’ customers and partners are Russian companies, and only
some of their machinery comes from abroad. What is peculiar about these firms is that they are easy to
impress, since they are not used to European quality and service.

However, not all customers in Russia are like them. This article introduces one of Cargotec’s important
customers in Russia that is an international enterprise itself.

Progressive since 1990

Ladenso JSC is a joint Russian-Finnish enterprise of the forest industry and a daughter enterprise of Finnish-
Swedish concern Stora Enso. It uses Western production base and contemporary forest saving
technologies.

The enterprise’s principal activities comprise timber harvesting and logging, log-processing, as well as
construction of timber-carrying roads. All its employees have completed a specialized training either in
Finland or at Ladenso in a form of on-going in-house training.

Ladenso started operating on Russian market in 1990. Besides the domestic market, the enterprise exports
its products to such markets as Finland, France, Holland, Belgium, England. Ladenso exports coniferous
eaves board, bold timber, conifer, birch and aspen pulp wood, pulpchips, and raw fuel.

Close collaboration with the Greenpeace and the Biodiversity Conservation Centre (BCC) is one of the
dominant requirements set before the enterprise by its Western partners. The enterprise’s principal
shareholder Stora Enso handles rigid control of environmental sustainability in the forests leased by
Ladenso.

The enterprise operates at three logging grounds in Pitkyaranta, Sortavala and Salmi. Realizing their
responsibility for the environment, they harvest 45,7% of the timber by selection cutting, which requires
special techniques and manoeuvrable machinery.
The enterprise applies only cut-to-length logging technique. It ensures the most rational cutting along with
minimization of harm to the environment.

“This is optimal, and thus profitable”, - Alexey Markin, Ladenso’s technical manager, comments, - “Most of
harvesting machinery producers focus on this technology, accordingly”.

The company has won prestigious international contests, which is not typical for a regular enterprise
operating somewhere in Russian province. Alexey Markin explains the motivation behind this.

“Ladenso appeared as a joint enterprise over 20 years ago”, - he says, - “From the first days, it has been
applying cutting-edge Scandinavian technologies that were present in Finland and Sweden by that time.
Nowadays, as Ladenso became an affiliate of Stora Enso concern, it has become clear, that only the most
advanced technologies ensure timber industry market stability. Permanent pursuit of improvement is
encouraged at any level”.

Ladenso operates quite as a European enterprise, as for technologies, personnel management, client
management, etc.

To explain the benefits of application of forest-saving technologies, Alexey says: “We are a long-lease
tenant. Today we are working back at the same sites where we started in 1990. The correct understanding
of forest management allows making harvesting process harmless for the forests as well as advantageous
for the business, with respect to road construction and other infrastructure”.

What differs Ladenso from most of Cargotec’s Russian customers, is their quite reasonable exactingness
towards the service. Ludmila Timonina, marketing and sales assistant at Cargotec IB, admits: “This customer
requires particular attention and specific offer”.

Reliability and capacity are crucial

Ladenso harvests all its timber by wheeled machinery, i.e. by a harvester and a forwarder. Fellers get
involved and substitute the harvester only to finalize the woodland.

Harvesting works continue the whole year round in hard conditions.

Alexey Markin adds: “The most difficult conditions are bog soils and unstable temperature conditions”.

 Ladenso’s logging truck park consists of nearly 20 units. The company used to run purely Kesla machinery
before. In 2007, they started renewing the park. At that point, their cooperation with Cargotec started.

As Alexey Markin explains, the decision to start dealing with Cargotec was motivated by “a will to compare
the quality and service provided by Cargotec to those offered by Kesla”.

At the moment, Ladenso runs mainly Hiab Loglift 96STs combined with Volvo chassis. The company that
mounts the cranes onto the chassis for Ladenso is another Russian-Finnish enterprise JYFA.
Hiab Loglit 96ST is the most popular cut-to-length crane. Perhaps, this is due to the optimal combination of
power, quickness and efficiency. Its maximal net lifting capacity is 89 kNm, while the boom reach equals
9,65m. This allows picking logs right from the further edge of a pile and load them to the back of the truck.

However, it is a crane with the top seat, not with a cabin. A cabin crane seems to be more safe and fitting
for Karelian weather. Alexey Markin explains the choice: “The aspect of observability, as well as loading
efficiency, is of the greatest importance for us, since we harvest many cut-to-length logs at a moment”.

Ladenso have refused to purchase more from Kesla. They have selected Hiab machinery for its capacity,
reliability and ease of maintenance, which Alexey emphasizes repeatedly. About Kesla, he adds: “Our
experience of running Kesla cranes from 2004 made us search for a more reliable machinery. We analyzed
the state of Kesla cranes by the end of the fourth year of running in our conditions, and it did not satisfy us.
As a result, we made the decision to try more reliable Loglift cranes”.

Alexander Azarevich, the sales manager for Loglift and Jonsered at Cargotec RUS LLC, comments: “Using
Kesla cranes, Ladenso had to overhaul that equipment yearly. Loglift cranes do not require yearly repair.
They are somewhat more expensive than those supplied by Kesla, but thanks to their reliability, our cranes
turn to be less costly for our customer”.

Alexey Markin acknowledges the ease of maintenance of Hiab cranes: “It is rather easy to maintain this
mechanism. We do not frequently have to replace parts, and when we happen to, it does not take much
effort”.

Keeping timber on the move

Among the major benefits of Hiab equipment, besides its reliability, capacity and ease of maintenance,
Alexey Markin mentiones durability of parts, which is especially crucial in Karelia with its unpredictable
weather and underdeveloped infrastructure that does not always allow prompt delivery of parts.

However, when it comes to a problem, Cargotec discovers new opportunities for improvements to its
service in Russia. This is where its values like “working together” and “global presence – local service” are
so vital for a sustainable cooperation, even though it happens some 50 miles far from Finland, and not in
Siberia.

Alexey Markin comments: “We have recently had a number of complications with repair and, accordingly,
with delivery of parts. Cargotec’s specialists cope with their tasks, however I wish the time of delivery of
parts were shorter, and the offer of parts at stocks in Karelia were more diverse. We have to organize more
efficient relationships regarding the correct running conditions of the hydraulic manipulators and their
maintenance”.
Maintenance of the machinery is provided not directly by Cargotec, but by Petrotruckservice, a service
center of Volvo in Petrozavodsk, Karelia. “For Ladenso, it is easier to have both chassis and cranes
maintained at one and the same center”, - Alexander Azarevich notes, - “I imagine that there can be certain
complications caused by their relationships regarding the combined maintenance of the equipment”.

Establishing closer cooperation with Petrotruckservice looks like a way out for Cargotec.

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Cargotec has got plenty of loyal and satisfied customers across Russia. However, the experience of
cooperation with probably the closest of them, both territorially and with respect to mentality, makes
Cargotec learn and improve.
Cargotec will certainly find new solutions to overcome barriers set by the Russian reality to keeping cargo
on the move.

Gleb Bogatskiy, September 2012