Bromma enjoys good year as sales increase

Order intake in Q4 slowed down marginally compared to the first three quarters but is still at a good level.

“The strong development for our yard spreaders previously reported continued in the second half of the year,” said Vikram Raman, commercial director at Bromma.

“Our all-electric yard spreaders represent a majority of the orders, often used in automated terminals. This is highlighted by the order to deliver the spreaders for the yard cranes in Jebel Ali T4,” he continued.

New IMO legislation on verification of container weight will come into force in July 2016. Even though the responsibility for verifying the weight is with the shippers, it provides a business opportunity for container terminals to offer weighing services to the shippers.

The Brommas Weight Verification system with load sensors mounted on the spreader twistlocks enables containers to be weighed without affecting cycle times and hindering the logistic flow in the terminal. Interest in this type of solution is steadily increasing as the deadline approaches.

Lars Meurling, marketing director for Bromma, explained: “The ‘weight-verification train’ for terminals is about to leave the station but there are very few people on-board.”

“Offering weight verification services to the shippers is an excellent business opportunity for the terminals but perhaps also a necessity for the logistic chain to work well after July 1,” he continued.

“Our twistlock based load sensing system is an excellent option for terminals who want to implement a weighing system. The accuracy of our system is high but not as high as the specification of a weigh bridge. But when a weigh bridge is used, the process to calculate the actual container weight adds inaccuracies which in most cases adds up to an inaccuracy higher than what we are achieving with our system.

“This is something the national regulatory bodies must be made aware of in order not to make decision based on misperceptions,” Mr Meurling warned.

Orders have been placed with Bromma for its range of spreaders including the YSX40E, YSX45 and 45E, and the STS45 and SSX45 by the Port of Tanjung Pelepas in Malaysia, Qingdao Port International in China, King Abdullah Seaport in Saudi Arabia, the Pireaus Container Terminal in Greece, ADPC Khalifa Port in Abu Dhabi, Pusan Newport International Terminal in Korea, Antwerp Gateway in Belgium, APMT Pier 400 in Los Angeles, Dalian Container Terminal in China, and Westports in Malaysia. DPW in Dubai have also placed orders for their T2 and T4 terminals.