The Tip of Africa

The Global UD Trucks Customer Magazine #01 2011 TRUCKING AROUND THE TIP OF AFRICA Dealing with A Special Space for Heat and the Ultimate Earthquake Engine Assembly Heavy Hauling f you’re in Tokyo from December 3 to 11, be sure and visit us at the Tokyo Motor IShow! Visit our booth, EC03, in the East Hall 1 of the Tokyo Big Sight exhibition center in Ariake. For more information, please talk to your local UD Trucks dealer—and hope to see you there! 04 Feature story Dealing with the #01 | 2011 ultimate earthquake disaster UD Trucks and its partners found themselves at the center of the devastating March 2011 earthquake and tsunami on Japan’s northeast coast. 06 News What’s happening Around the world of UD Trucks. Message from the President 08 In Action Globalization and UD Trucks Trucking around the tip of Africa UD customer Ngululu Bulk Carriers is succeeding despite the harsh environment and changing ver the past decades, “globalization” has become demands of South Africa. a word that is used very often, but one that carries many meanings. Some see it as something to strive O History for; some fear it; for others it simply is the way things are in 13 today’s globally interconnected world. Chasing the UD Trucks DNA At UD Trucks, globalization means taking advantage of the A look back over the many years of the best of two worlds: nurturing and developing the traditions company, and its long dedication to building and strengths of UD Trucks while also utilizing the knowledge, the best vehicles possible. technology and resources of the Volvo Group. It’s a big challenge, both for the corporation, and for the people who work here. 16 Technology But it’s also our greatest opportunity for the future—again, A special space for engine both for the growth of the company, and for the development of assembly in Ageo Roads is published our people. In a factory-within-a-factory at UD Trucks’ three times per year by This goes to more than just language, of course. Here’s a good main production center in Japan, tomorrow’s UD Trucks Corporation www.udtrucks.com example: Japanese are pretty good at making things—the interna- engines are built on a sophisticated, automated line. tional success of Japanese brands proves this, I feel. But sometimes Publisher a focus on getting things almost too perfect in Japan has meant a Daisuke Takahashi First person daisuke.takahashi@ loss of cost efficiency. 18 udtrucks.co.jp What I want to work toward is a blending of the best of Japa- Heat and heavy hauling Tel: +81-48-726-7462 nese and European traditions. The Japanese focus on craftsman- Mining coal in Indonesia puts huge demands Editorial Production ship, engineering and high quality, while at the same time making on trucks; the people who use UD Trucks here Next Inc. [email protected] use of the Volvo Group’s global manufacturing strength, product daily tell their stories. www.nextinc.com development methods, component technologies and excellent Tel: +81-3-6436-4270 cost-performance. Tradition Editor-in-Chief 20 Kjell Fornander We want to be able to provide our customers with high- The cutting edge of history quality, highly-reliable trucks, and to give them a reasonable Executive Editor A young Japanese craftsman carries on the William Ross price. We have a lot to give, and a lot to learn, with the ultimate demanding work of crafting one of the world’s Art Director goal of continuing to develop and improve so that our custom- most superb swords—the katana. Koichi Asano ers likewise have a continuously-improving competitive edge. Production Manager “Evolutionary rather than revolutionary”—this has always Case Study Haruko Miyazaki been the UD Trucks way, and that’s one thing that will 22 Diminishing damage not change. Okamura Logistics Corporation figured out how We’ve just started down this road, and it’s a very exciting to reduce product damage during storage and landscape ahead of us. Because, really, globalization means shipment—by getting everyone involved. the road to UD Trucks’ success, the road to Volvo’s success, and, ultimately, the road to our customers’ success. Contributors this issue: Jette Kristiansen Fox Torbjörn Selander Jim Hand-Cukierman Originally from Denmark, Based in Cape Town, South Canadian Jim Hand- Jette Kristiansen Fox is a Africa, Torbjörn Selander Cukierman is a Tokyo-based Satoru Takeuchi freelance writer based in is a photojournalist and photographer and writer Cape Town covering African contributor to publications whose work appears in maga- President, UD Trucks Corporation affairs for a range of Scandi- in the region, Europe and zines around the world. navian magazines. the United States. Cover photograph Torbjörn Selander Dealing with the Ulti mate Earthquake Disaster Knocked down, but definitely not t was, in a word, terrifying. ter he and his employees struggled to keep from out: UD Trucks and one of its key “There were 19 of us in the second floor, being washed away—and all of them survived— partners in northeast Japan rebuild getting buffeted by the water as it rose up they fought the early-spring cold with nurses’ to our chests,” says Iwao Kanno. “We saw a uniforms given them by the hospital across the after one of the world’s worst big tank float by, then a steel-frame build- road (“I put one on upside down!” Mr. Kanno natural disasters. Iing crashed into us. We still don’t know where it laughs), then waited it out until help arrived by Text: William Ross came from.” helicopter airlifts the next day. Photos: Koji Mukaida Mr. Kanno, president of Kanno Jidosha (“mo- Even further inland, at the site of UD Trucks’ tors”) was there, very close to the waterfront, Sendai Office, General Manager Yasushi Sato when the March 11, 2011 tsunami, generated says that the effect of the earthquake alone by the largest earthquake in Japanese history, completely brought their business to a halt. “The washed into—and almost totally destroyed—his electricity went out immediately after the earth- The main building of UD Trucks’ Sendai Office (left) hometown of Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture. quake,” he says. The quake, which measured a was largely unharmed by Mr. Kanno and the 19 of his 23 employees at the massive 9 at its epicenter, and more than 7 in the earthquake, although time who held on together for dear life were ex- the Sendai area, destroyed electrical generation, the adjacent building and tremely lucky; nearly 20,000 people were killed transmission and transforming equipment. “We service area were more seriously damaged. The as the massive waves washed across much of the had no idea what was happening with the tsu- area was not reached by northeastern coast of Japan. nami until we got an electrical generator going the tsunami waves. But Mr. Kanno, who provides sales and service and turned on a TV. I should have gotten a car ra- for UD Trucks, as well as for passenger cars and dio going earlier,” he says with a shake of his head, heavy machinery, is nothing if not a survivor. Af- “but there was just so much going on.” Luckily, the 04 #01 | 2011 Feature story 02 03 “People wanted their trucks serviced, but there was often seawater damage” Yasushi Sato 01. Iwao Kanno looks at the remains of his business—the source of the building to the left still unknown. 02. A ship washed nearly a kilometer away from the sea speaks to the size of the tsunami. 03. Yasushi Sato, General Manager of UD’s Sendai Office: “We’re very much focused on helping our customers get their work back to normal.” 04. Iwao Kanno with the mobile service truck provided by UD Trucks: “We can put it to work!” Dealing with the Ulti mate 04 thinking about our customers. it unusable for the future), he shakes his head “We knew that they wouldn’t be able to use and gives a wry smile. “We lost all our records, their trucks very quickly,” he continues. “But our computers, mobile phones, financial records, there were a lot of trucks that had been aban- invoices—everything.” Even so, he got his first Earthquake Disaster doned, or were damaged, so first we got a tow request for service from a customer about 10 truck set up to help with that work. We knew days after the disaster. “There’s not much we 01 that people would want repairs, even if not right could do for them, since we didn’t have a work- away, so we decided to bring them to the office shop,” he says. “So we referred them to another here, although we knew it would be really tight.” service center—I guess our main work is in refer- waves did not reach inland as far as the office. In fact, he says, they brought back more than 60 ring customers to service centers.” But the Sendai office did suffer the collapse of trucks for service, even though they knew repairs But Mr. Kanno is focused on the future, now several walls in the service area, falling masonry, couldn’t be done right away. beginning work on prefab buildings which will massive cracks in the building attached to the “Once we did get service going, there were house a service center until a permanent one can main office (which fortunately rode the quake out cases where, for safety’s sake, we had to have be built—but this time much further from the relatively unscathed), and a complete blackout.

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