Today our class visited a company named Sandvik and this company was extremely interesting with its futuristic machinery and robots. Sandvik is originally a Swedish company that was started over 150 years ago and manufactures mining equipment, industrial tools, and all sorts of tools made out of steel or some kind of metal. The specific plant we visited today accounts for about 10% of the productivity in manufacturing throughout Sandvik and the plant in Mebane, North Carolina doesn’t specifically sell anything to a customer but it transports it to a hub in Kentucky to be sold.
Sandvik’s mission statement states, “Sandvik Coromant is the world’s leading supplier of tools, tooling solutions, and know-how to the metalworking industry. With extensive investments in research and development, we create unique innovations and set new productivity standards together with our customers. These include the world’s major automotive, aerospace, and energy industries.” Today during the presentation the Sandvik associate put a large emphasis on safety first. The very first thing the man ever talked about was safety. Also Sandvik is committed to keeping their products cutting-edge with state of the arc engineering products.
Sandvik’s customers include companies that need tools for drilling into steel or any sort of metal. Also they sell to mining and construction companies. Since Sandvik is originally a Swedish company they sell to companies all across the globe mostly in Germany, Sweden, China, and the United States. The plant we visited today again does not sell any products directly to a customer, all they do is transport the manufactured products to the hub in Kentucky. Sandvik’s customers ultimately value the quality of the product over anything else. Sandvik’s products may not be the cheapest products but they are definitely the best quality product in the world.
Sandvik has had exceptionally good results out of it’s 151 years of existence only two of those years were unprofitable. The company has a presence in over sixty countries. Also the company has come along way since just manufacturing drilling products in Sweden 150 years ago, now it has a worldwide presence in the metal products market.
Sandvik’s manufacturing plant in Mebane North Carolina has a plan for the future to become profitable enough to start using the other half of their warehouse because at the moment it is empty. The plant needs to make enough profit to maybe expand and put more equipment or machinery in the other half of the warehouse. Also in a couple of years they want to even expand the warehouse even more by building on the land they have already bought behind their current buildings. Overall, I really thought the Sandvik plant was extremely interesting. Especially the equipment that is used to manufacture the pieces. Also it was interesting to learn how much more efficient making these parts today is compared to a couple years ago with the new and improved robots that create so many short cuts. Their machinery was truly state of the arc and they’re obviously a very successful company if they have been profitable for over 150 years.
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