The event was made even more special by the celebration of their 13,000th machine
The 13,000th machine, a Ponsse Ergo 8w, was delivered to the company's German customer FoWi GmbH & Co. The occasion also marks the beginning of Ponsse and German distributor Wahlers Forsttechnik GmbH's jubilee year, with 25 years having passed since Ponsse and Wahlers signed their contract on distribution and service collaboration in the German-speaking regions of Europe.
The current production facility investment is the biggest in Ponsse's history. The factory will expand from the current 2.7 hectares to 4 hectares. The extension of production facilities allows the company to respond to changing market situations with more flexibility, and to tailor machines to customer requirements more efficiently in a serial-production environment. The new facilities in Vieremä will be completed by the end of the year. Ponsse indicates that it will be the most advanced forest machine production facility in the world.
The Ponsse factory in Vieremä currently employs 570 employees, 390 of whom work in production tasks. All Ponsse machines are made in Vieremä, Finland. The new factory will be in operation by the end of the year. New assembly lines and storage facilities housed in the new extension will be phased in gradually during 2018. Relocation to new facilities starts in March with warehouse operations. New smart warehouse technologies make production warehouse logistics more efficient and increase the degree of automation considerably. Warehouse automation covers 15,500 storage slots for small items and components and 3,900 pallet positions.
After the warehouse relocation, a new harvester head assembly line will move to the new facilities. A new assembly line for base machines will be in operation by the end of the summer, and by end of 2018 cabin and crane assembly lines will also be renewed. The amount of production-time testing used to support quality control will increase in all production lines. Source