E-Motive, Tl Jones And Memco Become Avire

Worldwide

Avire (pronounced “a-VIRE,” rhyming with “fire”) Ltd. is the new corporate identity of E-Motive, TL Jones and Memco. The conglomerate offers an extensive range of safety and communication products. Its manufacturing locations are in Singapore, China, India and the Czech Republic, and it operates sales offices in 13 locations worldwide.

Avire’s products include light curtains, electronic displays, emergency telephones and LED lighting. E-Motive has been producing displays and accessories for elevator cars and landings for 20 years and recently added touch-control panels to its product portfolio. TL Jones has a 70-year history and markets passenger-detection devices for elevator doors to Asia, Australasia and, increasingly, other parts of the world. Its products are predominately manufactured in China and assembled in India. Memco has been manufacturing elevator safety devices, designed and built in Europe, for more than 40 years. Its product portfolio includes emergency telephones, passenger detectors for doors and LED lighting systems.

Avire company contact Faye Wilson can be reached at phone: (44) 0-1628-540161, fax: (44) 0-1628-621947 or e-mail: faye.wilson@avire-global.com. More on the company can be found at website: www.avire-global.com.

Bahamas

International Certification Program

The Bahamas Agricultural and Industrial Corp. (BAIC), a public/private partnership including Bahamas Elevator Systems, has announced there should be a minimum of 50 qualified elevator technicians and inspectors in the Bahamas. A BAIC study prompted the founding of a new training initiative at the Bahamas Technical and Vocational Institute to expand its curriculum and offer international certification. The partnership found it challenging to locate qualified trained elevator technicians to meet the demands of certain projects and wishes to train young Bahamians to fill the need of serving the commonwealth’s elevator industry, which The Freeport News reports is predominately staffed by non-Bahamians. This is ostensibly because most local technicians do not carry internationally recognized certification.

China

Elevator Installation Guidelines

The Chinese government has issued guidelines for the design, installation, operation and maintenance of elevators, escalators and moving walks in Macau, according to the Macau Daily Times. The Land, Public Works and Transport Bureau (DSSOPT) released the guidelines and instructions, which were expected to take effect on May 19. The guidelines will require existing equipment to undergo yearly inspections and obtain a safety certificate. In addition, the government said it will perform random inspections on at least 5% of the city’s 5,000 machines. DSSOPT officials said the instructions are intended as preparation for new regulations regarding vertical-transportation equipment. The bureau will create a database in which to record the information.

Avire Selects Dewhurst As Hong Kong Distributor

Avire, a provider of elevator safety and communication systems, has chosen Dewhurst as its supplier in Hong Kong and Macau. Dewhurst has manufactured elevator components for more than 90 years, and will now supply light curtains from Avire’s Memco and TL Jones brands. “We are very excited about this partnership,” said Eric Fung, Dewhurst’s general manager. “We feel that a market like Hong Kong, where there are many prestigious buildings, will welcome [our] equipment.”

Andy Harbidge, Avire’s sales and marketing director, added, “We look forward to working with Dewhurst to develop the Hong Kong market. [It was] a logical and easy choice of supplier, given our current distribution relationships with them in the U.K. and Australia.”

Dewhurst is known for its push-button products, often sold under the Dupar brand. With its office and warehouse located in central Kowloon, the company can supply goods to all of Hong Kong’s lift companies.

Mitsubishi Signs Contract For Zhuhai CBD

According to the Shanghai Elevator Trade Association, Shanghai Mitsubishi Elevator has signed a contract with Zhuhai HuaFa Group for the Shizimen Central Business District (CBD) project in Zhuhai, China. Its work includes 137 Mitsubishi elevators of various types. The district is considered architecturally modern and is to include a hotel, office and meeting center across 270,000 m2. One of the buildings is reported to become the tallest building in Zhuhai once complete.

Egypt

Liftech Expo 2013

LifTech Expo 2013 will be held at the Cairo International Convention Center on December 2-5. Both domestic companies and those from 40 other countries are expected to exhibit in the 4,000 m2 earmarked for the event.

Additionally, at least 30 international buyers from the Middle East/North Africa region will be invited. More than 7,500 visitors and 110 exhibitors are projected to attend. Organizer Lead Trade Fairs was pleased with the event’s turnout at last year’s iteration, which included exhibitors from Egypt, China, Turkey, Italy, South Korea, Finland, Germany, Greece, India, Japan, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, the U.K. and the U.S.

For more information, contact Lead Trade Fairs at phone: (202) 2-505-2615 or 2-505-2815, fax: (202) 2-505-2615, e-mail: ashokry@ltf-eg.com, or website: www.ltf-eg.com.

Germany

Thyssenkrupp Announces Job Cuts, Fiscal Results

ThyssenKrupp AG, parent company of ThyssenKrupp Elevator, has announced it will cut 3,000 of its 15,000 office jobs over the next three years to streamline its administration. A May press release explained the move as part of an effort to make its business structure more efficient and transparent. Despite the elimination of jobs, the company says it plans to work with employee representatives and avoid involuntary layoffs. It aims “to change the understanding of leadership and the corporate culture in terms of greater openness, transparency and integration, and improve performance and efficiency throughout the group.” Further to that end, it has streamlined the functions and structure of its executive board and reduced its corporate functions and service units from 26 to 17 and reorganized them.

The company met its operating targets in the first half of fiscal year 2012/2013, yet earnings before income taxes (EBIT) decreased for that period by EUR263 million (US$337 million) from the previous year. A EUR683-million (US$874.7-million) charge for the reduced value of its steel plants in the U.S. and Brazil, which it is trying to sell, resulted in a further impairment loss. ThyssenKrupp reported it was in negotiations to sell the Steel Americas segment in May. It expects such a deal would provide the cash inflow to significantly reduce its temporarily increased gearing again and substantially improve the earnings, cash flow, value-added and competitive profile of the company.

ThyssenKrupp Elevator reported significant growth in the first half of the fiscal year, with order intake up 8% to EUR3.2 billion (US$4.1 billion) and sales up 9% to 2.9 billion (US$3.72 billion). Its adjusted EBIT came to EUR315 million (US$403.5 million), an increase of EUR41 million (US$52.52 million). The company attributed the improvement to a growth in sales and positive effects from restructuring measures initiated in the last fiscal year.

India

Otis Receives Contract For Metro Project

L&T Metro Rail (Hyderabad) Ltd. (LTMRHL) has awarded Otis a contract to supply 670 elevators and escalators for the Hyderabad Metro Rail project. Otis will install 260 Gen2® Premier elevators and 410 520 NPE escalators in more than 66 stations, workshops and other buildings at depots. Otis will maintain the equipment for 10 years after a two-year warranty period. According to V.B. Gadgil, chief executive and managing director of LTRHL, “I am pleased that as of now, we are well within our timeframe of executing the project ahead of schedule.” Sebi Joseph, managing director of Otis India, also commented on the project, “This is a landmark [project] for Otis, as it is one of the largest single contracts in the history of the Indian elevator and escalator industry.”

The Gen2 Premier elevator system is designed to combine energy-efficient technology with passenger safety and comfort. The equipment includes a flat-belt system that replaces conventional steel ropes, and its compact size eliminates the need for a machine room. The equipment will be fabricated in Otis’ factories in China.

Indonesia

Otis To Expand Market

In May, The Jakarta Post reported that Otis plans to strengthen its position in the country’s growing economy. With 65% of its population projected to move to large    cities such as Jakarta, Medan and Surabaya, Patrick Blethon, president of Otis Asia Pacific, believes there will be several strong opportunities over the next 25 years. “We want to increase our market coverage in Indonesia,” Blethon said. Otis is also considering opening a manufacturing plant in a Southeast Asian country in the near       future, having recently opened a “center of expertise” in Shanghai.

New projects include government office buildings and small airports. Colliers International, a property consultant, says at least 61 new hotels are expected to enter the Jakarta market by 2015, which will create demand for elevators and escalators.

Netherlands

Kone To Equip Amsterdam Airport

KONE has received a contract to supply elevators, escalators and moving walks to the Amsterdam Airport Schipol. The order includes 43 MonoSpace® elevators, 28 TravelMaster® 110 escalators, 13 TransitMaster® 120 escalators, one TransitMaster 140 escalator, and eight TransitMaster 185 moving walks. Thirty-two of the escalators and moving walks will be powered by KONE’s Direct Drive™, which is 20% more efficient than conventional worm-gear solutions. Installation is scheduled to begin this year, with the equipment being opened to the public in 2015.

The facility is the country’s main international airport, serving more than 51 million passengers annually. In 2012, it was selected as the best airport in Europe for the third time by the Airports Council International Europe. KONE has worked with the airport for 40 years, and in 2011, was chosen as the main contractor for the maintenance of all escalators, elevators and automatic doors.

North America

Gefran Appoints Business Development Manager

   In May, global manufacturer Gefran SPA Inc. announced it named Stefano Molaschi its Business Development manager, Sensor Products for North America. He will be responsible for developing all strategic planning, marketing, and sales for Gefran’s Sensor Product division and supporting the company’s efforts in the continent. Molaschi has held senior-level positions with Gefran and OMRON Milan. He holds a Computer Science diploma.

Eric Kirleis, Gefran’s managing director, said of Molaschi:

“We are extremely excited [he] will be supporting our efforts in North America. [Molaschi] has been the World Wide Product manager for the [company’s] sensor products for the last 10 years. . . . The Sensor product division has seen significant growth worldwide due to his leadership, in-depth product knowledge and his strong engineering background. His experience and leadership will provide Gefran the added focus to our sensor product line and expand our North American footprint. [Molaschi’s] background of over 18 years as a product manager and product engineer in the automation industry, including components, sensors and software for the industrial and manufacturing markets, will help bring our business in North America to the next level. . . .”

Molaschi stated, “My goal is to provide as much visibility to Gefran as possible in order to bring the same high-quality product line to North America, which already prevails in Europe and Asia.”

Russia

Kone To Equip Kuntsevo Center

KONE was contracted to provide the new Kuntsevo Center in western Moscow with 101 pieces of equipment, including elevators, escalators and moving walks. The redeveloped multiuse complex will rise to a height of up to 75 m and include 38 MonoSpace® Special elevators, a TranSys™ elevator, 47 TravelMaster™ escalators and 14 TravelMaster™ 115 moving walks. A dumbwaiter with a speed of 0.63 mps will also be delivered to the site. A 10-year maintenance contract is included in the agreement. The passenger elevators to be installed at the site feature car interiors that combine mirror-polished and brushed stainless-steel walls, and perforated ceilings. The escalators and moving walks include what KONE calls “a non-standard solution” of lighting inside the truss.

The 246,000-m2 mixed-use development will include a shopping mall, two residential towers, a cluster of office buildings and a 2,000-car parking facility. KONE’s customer in the project is Turkish construction company ENKA Construction, and the building is designed by architecture firm The Jerde Partnership. Demolition of the existing shopping center began in July 2011, and the new development is scheduled for completion in the first quarter of 2014.

Saudi Arabia

CMA Tower Consulting Contract

Lerch Bates Inc. has been selected by architectural firm HOK and engineering consultancy Omrania & Associates to join the team constructing the Capital Market Authority (CMA) tower in Riyadh. Lerch Bates will provide vertical-transportation, façade-access and materials-management expertise during the construction of what is to be the tallest commercial tower in the Middle East when completed in 2014.

The 76-story, 1,263-ft.-tall CMA tower will be served by two double-deck sky lobbies and include 11 double-deck shuttle cars; 17 ThyssenKrupp Elevator TWIN elevators with two separate traction drives that allow two cars to travel on the same set of rails, one above the other; 12 escalators; and 12 additional elevators, including service units. The slim tower’s vertical-transportation units will generate electricity from lift-car inertia during downward braking.

Jeff Marsh, Lerch Bates’ director of business development, commented on the project:

“Lerch Bates is honored to provide the consulting of its three core competencies, vertical transportation, façade access and materials management, on the construction of Saudi Arabia’s new tallest commercial skyscraper. The tower will provide many firsts for the kingdom, including the first building in the country to utilize a TWIN elevator system, the first superstructure to be Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Gold certified and the first to use triple-pane, utilized glazing on its façade.”

The CMA tower will be the focal point of the King Abdullah Financial District (KAFD), a development to consist of dozens of towers intended to transform the kingdom into a major Middle Eastern business hub. KAFD will host the CMA headquarters, Tadawul (the kingdom’s stock exchange), banks, financial institutions and other service providers. It will include 1.98 million sq. ft. of area, an auditorium, dining areas and leisure facilities.

South Korea

Thyssenkrupp Elevator’s “BMW In Elevators”

Invest Korea reported in April that Wayne Park, CEO of ThyssenKrupp Elevator Korea, introduced a project called “BMW in Elevators” at his Mok-dong office. Park is striving for differentiation in the market in an effort to develop “an instantly recognizable brand,” as opposed to a more industrial-styled product. The company has operated in South Korea since 2003, supplying passenger and freight elevators, escalators, moving walks and other equipment.

ThyssenKrupp Elevator Korea’s main businesses involve production, domestic sales, maintenance of the 60,000 elevator units installed in the country and the export of products to more than 60 other nations. In addition to its headquarters in Mok-dong, it has a factory in Cheonan, 12 branches nationwide and 1,300 subcontractors for service and installation. Last year, the company sold 4,500 elevator units domestically, achieving a 3%    return on sales. One of its upcoming projects is to install a high-speed ThyssenKrupp Elevator lift in the Federation of Korean Industries building in Yeouido to travel at approximately 7 mps. It has also installed its parent company’s TWIN system in seven South Korean office buildings.

OTIS’ Blethon Sets Goals

According to its Asia Pacific President Patrick Blethon, Otis expects to expand its presence in the country by increasing investment and sales Blethon said the firm will seek to pursue sustainable growth by capitalizing on a highly competitive maintenance portfolio and deeply rooted localization strategies.

“We are pushing Korea to the next step in terms of growth,” Blethon said in a Korea Times interview in Seoul, going on to explain that as elevators have gotten older, maintenance and technology have become the industry’s new trend, making it possible to capture more revenue in the service business. In 2012, Otis achieved 100,000 maintenance units, which he said is one of the biggest maintenance portfolios, globally.

Blethon expects the company’s South Korean segment revenue to grow by double digits this year, having approached KRW1 trillion (US$900.2 million) last year. So far, (in the first quarter 2013), the company’s operations have already enjoyed double-digit growth in new equipment. Otis’ localization strategy has been credited for much of the growth, having developed what Blethon describes as “a strong leadership team” in the country. He went on to describe some difficulties Otis faces:

“Sometimes, the supply chain can be a challenging factor for us. I would say sometimes turnover could be another distraction. We rely on local people we want to grow inside. Another challenge that we specifically face here in [South] Korea is how to balance, particularly, the cost of labor increases by providing more efficient services to customers.”

When asked about the future of gender integration for the company, Blethon replied:

“The portion of female employees is about single digit. This is traditional in this industry. We recognized this issue, and we are making efforts to change that. We want to have female leaders in key positions in each level of the company. It brings a lot to our organization.”

U.A.E.

Dubai Frame Completion Date Set

Dubai Municipality has reported the Dubai Frame, a 150-m-tall, 105-m-wide structure shaped like a window frame, will be completed by the end of 2014. It lies within Zabeel Park, an AED120-million (US$32.3-million) project that won the ThyssenKrupp Elevator International Architecture Award in 2009 (ELEVATOR WORLD, July 2009). Dubai Frame is intended to highlight both old and new sides of the city, with newer icons such as the Burj Khalifa visible through one side, and older parts of the city such as Dubai Creek and Deira through the other. The structure will be completely transparent, with elevators that will take visitors to a viewing deck at its peak.

In addition to Dubai Frame, Zabeel Park will feature a museum and is expected to attract up to two million      visitors per year. The municipality added that seven major projects were on track for completion by the end of next year, including Dubai Safari, to eventually replace the   existing Dubai Zoo, as well as markets and the Al Ayas Shopping Complex. The total cost of all these developments is expected to reach AED883.5 million (US$240.53 million).

U.K.

Symposium On Lift & Escalator Technologies To Be Held In September

    Following the success of last year’s Lift & Escalator Symposium in Northampton, the organizers decided to extend this year’s event to two full days. The symposium will be held on September 26-27 in Northampton. Though there are still event presentations to be announced, the program will include the following: 

• “Converting the User Requirements Into an Elevator Traffic Design: The HARint Space” by Lutfi Al-Sharif and Osama F. Abdel Aal
• “Derivation of an Elevator Round Trip Time Formula Under Up-Peak Traffic for the Case of Four Special  Conditions” by Rasha Khaleel1, Al-Sharif and Mazuz Salahat
• “Passenger Flow Pattern Learning Based on Trip Counting in Elevator Systems Combined with Real-Time     Information” by Rosa Basagoiti, Maite Beamurgia, Dr. Richard Peters and Stefan Kaczmarczyk
• “The UK’s First Urban Cable Car” by David Cooper
• “Modelling and Simulation of a High-Rise Elevator  System to Predict the Dynamic Interactions Between Its Components” by Rafael Sánchez Crespo,  Kaczmarczyk, Phil Picton, Huijuan Su and Markus Jetter
• “Lift Design for Modern Office Buildings; What Is the Market Looking for?” by Len Halsey
• “Cabin Ventilation, Code Requirements and Experimental Results” by Noby Joseph and Dr. Rory Smith
• “Vibration Problems in Lift and Escalator Systems: Analysis Techniques and Mitigation Strategies” by  Kaczmarczyk
• “Energy Calculation and Classification for Lifts” by  Ana-Maria Lorentea and Dr. Gina Barney
• “Non-Linear Energy Accumulation Buffers” by Nick Mellor
• “The Multibody Dynamics Simulation and Visualization of Lift Systems” by Seyed Mirhadizadeh and       Kaczmarczyk
• “The Application of Simulation to Traffic Design and Dispatcher Testing” by Peters
• “Traffic Patterns in Hotels and Residential Buildings” by Marja-Liisa Siikonen
• “A Review of Waiting Time, Journey Time and Quality of Service” by Smith
• “The Revision of EN 81-1 And EN 81-2 to Become EN 81-20 and EN 81-50 (or, the Biggest Change to Lift Standards In The Last 20 Years)” by Ian Jones

Complete abstracts are available at website: www.lift
symposium.org.