Developing sustainable solutions for forestry is high on the agenda at Komatsu Forest, where an important initiative is the brand-new development department Electrification. One month has passed since Stina Drotz stepped into the role of General Manager of the department, whose main mission is to solve the challenges of electrification of Komatsu forest machines together with industry stakeholders.
“It feels both fun and important to be part of the sustainability journey and create the future of vehicles in the forest,” says Stina, who was attracted to the role because she gets the opportunity to work with high-tech vehicles in a future industry in technology.
Stina is a civil engineer and has a background in both the automotive and forestry industries. Although she has experience from similar projects, it is new to now participate in building a completely new department.
The key to success, Stina believes, is about developing people, both at individual and team level. People with different backgrounds and experiences will need to collaborate and lift each other up.
“My impression so far of Komatsu Forest is that here works open and engaged people who are curious about each other. There is closeness and good cooperation both between departments and within the department, which facilitates our work forward,” says Stina. “We work in a newly built, modern facility in a development environment that is at the forefront of digital solutions. You also have a unique opportunity to participate from idea to finished product.”
In particular, Stina sees three challenges with her new mission. In addition to the technical challenges that electrification entails, society’s infrastructure for electricity distribution also needs to be developed. In addition, it is important to find the right employees with the right skills.
The large industrial investments made in Norrland create great competition for new employees – a challenge that the company partly takes on by establishing a local office in Stockholm.
The new department is emerging, and recruitment is underway. Above all, the company seeks electric vehicle developers and engineers who are specialists in software, hardware, mechanics, hydraulics and energy.
“We are looking for skilled engineers who want to break new ground,” says Stina. “Komatsu Forest aims to reduce CO2- emissions from our machines by 50% by 2030, so within a few years I see that we have come a long way,” Stina concludes.
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Sustainable forest machines of the future
Komatsu Forest is further investing in the future and is building a completely new development department focusing on electrification of forest machines. With the initiative, the company wants to take the lead in the forest machinery industry and help reduce net carbon dioxide emissions from its forest machines. The initiative is fully in line with the company’s goals, where sustainability is fundamental to the entire business.
“We have a production facility that is close to carbon neutral, and we are working with the same goal-awareness to reduce CO2- emissions from the use of our forest machines. The vision is to reach a “net zero emission worksite”, says Erik Nilsson, CTO at Komatsu Forest.
“We see an increasing interest in our customers and partners in reducing the environmental impact of forest machines. We aim to reduce CO2- emissions from our products by 50% by 2030 and expect to have something on the market before then,” says Peter Hasselryd, VP Marketing & Sales at Komatsu Forest.
Opening up for electrification in the forest is a groundbreaking technology step for Komatsu Forest – which at the same time poses major challenges. Since the machines work off-grid, there are many aspects to consider when developing new machine solutions. For the machines to be able to use different types of energy media, energy distribution solutions are needed for the workplace in the forest.
“We are happy to lead the way, but cooperation and partnership are an important part of the transition in the forest,” says Erik Nilsson. “To succeed, the development of new technologies and new system solutions that can offer our customers the ability to use renewable energy sources is required.”
The new development department will be expanded gradually, and the company are looking for people with several different types of competencies.
“We are looking for electric vehicle developers, hardware and software developers, computational engineers, application engineers in energy, hydraulics and mechanics, but we also see that we need new competencies in areas such as vehicle certification and testing, all with a genuine interest in developing products and solutions for a sustainable future,” says Nilsson.
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