Sales training new dates available

FTMTA Skillnet is hosting a third series of sales training days in May, in addition to a sales training course being staged on April 8 and 9. The third training opportunity for those in farm machinery sales will be the final one before the summer period.

The course has been developed by VFM Sales, in association with FTMTA, to suit the needs of the farm machinery industry. VFM has many years of experience in sales training within the farm and construction machinery industries.

The two-day training programme, which will be staged at the FTMTA Training Centre in Toughers Business Park, Newhall, Naas, Co Kildare, will have a maximum of 12 participants. FTMTA Skillnet is now seeking to fill some final places on this course by contacting FTMTA at ftmtas killnet@eircom.net or telephone 045-409309.

ARGO invests in McCormick support

The integration of McCormick tractor production into the ARGO Group's headquarters manufacturing and assembly plant in Italy has been completed as part of a €10 million investment in new and upgraded production facilities.

The McCormick CX and MC tractors, previously built in Doncaster, now share an existing 'four-cylinder' assembly line with similar size models in ARGO's Landini range, while the McCormick MC Power6, MTX and XTX tractors are built on an extensively upgraded line dedicated to six-cylinder engined models from both ranges.

Transferring production of McCormick's 'Doncaster' tractors to the ARGO plant at Fabbrico in northern Italy has been a major exercise, which first involved moving assembly of the group's specialist orchard and vineyard tractors to a new €2 million facility at Luzzara, approximately 20km away.

"We then needed a new paint shop to handle the McCormick tractors' larger chassis and had to create more space on the assembly floor, which involved building a new production warehouse,'' explains Fabbrico production manager Roberto Zamboni. "We also needed larger quality-control and final inspection areas and had to organise component sourcing and storage. Then, of course, we had to train our workforce to build the McCormick tractors to the same high quality standards as our Landini products.''

In addition to the €5 million spent at Fabbrico, a further €1 million was spent upgrading the San Martino factory making sub-100hp utility tractors. €2 million was spent doubling capacity at the group's dedicated cab manufacturing facility.

"We like to build as much of our tractors as possible to control quality,'' says Zamboni. "With only a few exceptions, we make all the transmissions, rear axles, front axles and cabs in our own factories.''

Future plans for the Fabbrico factory include relocating the design, engineering and R&D departments to an all-new facility to accommodate the extra engineers and other staff taken on to help develop the McCormick range. The output at the Fabbrico factory where 60hp to 200hp tractors are produced is running at a rate of 56 per day, with some more capacity still to come.

Amazone boosts sales by 20%

The German-based Amazone group has reported a 20% increase in the value of sales for 2007, to give a record turnover figure of €290million. Exports accounted for 80% of sales with the British, French and Scandinavian markets reported as particularly strong.

Amazone, which marks its 125-year anniversary this year, plans to use 5% of the sales figure for research and development. It also plans to achieve sales of €300million in 2008.

The company increased the scale of its production in November last with the addition of a new factory unit. This has been almost exclusively dedicated to the expansion of the sprayer range. Amazone employs about 1,500 employees in its main factory and in six other subsidiary production plants.