New CEO at Logitrans

Erling Pedersen, who has been working at Logitrans through the last 46 years and through most of them as President, will as per 1 May 2015 hand over this function to his daughter, Gitte Kirkegaard Berg, Sales Director at Logitrans. The third generation will thereby be head of the management. The company is family owned and founded by the parents of Erling Pedersen, Ingrid and Nis Andersen Pedersen on 1 May 1940.

Dorte Pedersen, also daughter of Erling Pedersen, is Production Director of Logitrans in Denmark and General Manager of Logitrans in China. Together Dorte and Gitte will constitute the management of Logitrans.

“Our father was born to take over our company and from a very young age he helped everywhere in the company. He knows every corner of the company and every screw on the products. He has a unique knowledge about products and customers – and about the link between product development and customer requirement. It should be no secret that this combination will be one of the largest challenges for us to handle in future”, Gitte Kirkegaard Berg says.

”Dorte and I are often asked whether it has always been planned that we should take over the company. It has not! We are three sisters, and I am sure that our father did not take for granted that we wanted to join the family company”, Gitte Kirkegaard Berg continues.

Both Dorte and Gitte are engineers, and it was therefore natural for them to join the company. Furthermore Gitte has completed an MBA in management. Dorte and Gitte have been employed in the company for 14 and 12 years respectively, and have since 2012 been main shareholders of the company. “We have during the years been involved in many different processes in the company, and we therefore feel ready and prepared to take over the management”, Gitte Kirkegaard Berg continues.

“Our father is not so easy to retire, and he has an intrinsic spark to continue working. Therefore he will still work in the company and will in future focus even more on product development and quality, as well as sales in China”, says Gitte Kirkegaard Berg.

”I look very much forward to taking over the CEO function and to leading on the values of my grandparents and parents. I want to ensure the continued development of Logitrans. I am honoured to have the opportunity to lead on such an old company, and I will do it my way and with respect for the fundamental culture, characterising our company and making us unique”, Gitte Kirkegaard Berg ends the interview.

75 years of innovation and tradition– Logitrans A/S celebrates 75 years anniversary…

The Danish manufacturer of material handling equipment, Logitrans A/S, celebrates its 75 years anniversary on 1 May 2015.

Logitrans was founded in a little smithy in 1940, and until 2002 the company was called Nisap Maskinfabrik. The beginning during the war was tough, and for the founders, Ingrid and Nis A. Pedersen, the war came close – both in the smithy and in the residence buildings.

However, the general attitude to life both in the smithy and in the residence buildings was from the beginning positive and characterised by a unique pioneering spirit. In her memories Ingrid describes the first years like this: “We had good neighbours, and when the streets started smelling of burned rye, we knew that we would soon gather for a cup of substitute coffee and barley meal bread. We learned to appreciate the good people, living around us, in a time when the world was out of order.”

Nis was creative and solution oriented and had a special interest in hydraulics and mechanics! He worked persistently with all requests and inquiries from the fishing industry and agriculture. From 1970, he started using his interest in hydraulic solutions to develop and manufacture material handling equipment, e.g. pallet trucks, highlifters and stackers.

From a young age Erling Pedersen, son of Nis and Ingrid Pedersen, helped everywhere in the company, and it was soon evident that he was to take over the company. Since 1975 he has been the CEO. He has continued working in the spirit of his father: Developing and designing unique products solving handling requirements of the customers. Focus is always on ergonomics, well-being and optimum working conditions of the users, when developing products and this continually contributes to increase efficiency and work satisfaction in the companies.

Through all these years, the company has been developing rapidly. Steadily, the share of exports has grown, and today more than 90% of the production is exported to more than 55 countries worldwide.

In celebration of the anniversary, Logitrans has made an exhibition in the factory, showing many of the unique products, developed and manufactured over the last 75 years.