28.12.2010

HBC Radiomatic UK

Crane Care, the UK distributor for remote control manufacturer HBC Radiomatic has set up a new business HBC-radiomatic UK which will start trading in January.

While the new company has the same directors and staff as Crane Care it will trade alongside the existing business as a ‘partner level’ business with HBC Germany.

The new company will offer an improved replacement parts availability and a unique dedicated on-site repair service, with a pre-booked 24 hour turnaround, full supported by HBC-radiomatic in Germany.

Sharon Evans, managing director of HBC-radiomatic UK said: “HBC-radiomatic products were Crane Care’s flagship product range, we were always passionate and impressed by the products innovation, quality and versatility. Because of our achievements over the years with Crane Care, Wolfgang Brendel, the owner of HBC- radiomatic Germany has encouraged us to establish the brand in it’s own right as a partner company and not just a distributor, giving us the versatility to meet diverse customer needs in an ever changing and demanding market and HBC-radiomatic in the UK was the way to achieve this.”
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Sharon Evans and the HBC UK technical team

“The launch of HBC-radiomatic UK, will bring with it the history and established industry relationships built up by Crane Care, which means that the UK market will now be offered an expanded quality of service for all of its radio needs. Unlike many other providers in today’s market our products can be repaired and serviced on site or at our recently refurbished, high tech service centre by our new ‘Partner Level’ team of technicians, now 99 percent of remotes do not need to return to the manufacturer for repair, providing our customers with that added level of reassurance and worldwide support.”

Vertikal Comment

In case you are wondering what this is all about, what this does is to channel all of the HBC business though a separate legal entity, while establishing the HBC brand in the UK.

While HBC represents a large part of its business Crane Care offers a lot more crane related products and services. The owners of Crane Care are now in their mid to late 50’s and may possibly be thinking of future exit strategies?

One obvious exit strategy would be to sell the business to HBC Germany, however it is unlikely to be interested in Crane Care’s other activities. This split of activity would help with that situation. The Crane Care name is also used and has been heavily promoted by Manitowoc for its all-encompassing product support programme.

Should this name confusion ever become a source of conflict a solution will need to be found. These are of course just our explanations of why such changes are usually implemented. What we do not know yet is whether the ownership split of HBC is different from Crane Care and even IF the German company has bought in to the new venture.