News Release
Manitowoc dealer SA French holds open day in South Africa
3/26/2014 Johannesburg, South Africa
L to R: Roy Midlane and Quentin Van Breda from Torre Industrial Holdings with David Semple, Eric Blanchard and Arnim Schon from Manitowoc at the open day
Manitowoc’s South African dealer for Potain tower cranes, SA French, welcomed more than 80 visitors to an open day in Johannesburg last month. The event highlighted the company’s position as a leading supplier of tower cranes in sub-Saharan Africa and allowed contractors and other crane users to learn more about SA French and its products and services.
Having recently become a subsidiary of Torre Industrial Holdings, an international engineering, equipment and finance company, SA French wants to strengthen its market-leading position within the growing African construction market, as company CEO Charles Pettit explains.
“We have restructured to meet the changing demands of the market and to capitalize on ways we can grow – and our Potain cranes are at the core of that initiative,” he says. “We have won a number of African infrastructure projects recently and our Potain cranes will be deployed at these job sites in the coming weeks. We are excited for the future and are confident that our equipment will help us expand even more.”
The main attraction at SA French’s open day was a 4 t capacity Potain Igo 50 self-erecting tower crane, the largest self-erecting crane in the Igo range and a major topic of conversation at the event.
Alongside the Igo 50 was a selection of Potain top-slewing tower cranes and a Grove GMK4100L all-terrain crane. The versatile 100 t capacity mobile crane offers an impressive 60 m main boom.
Established in 1982, SA French is one of South Africa’s premier construction equipment suppliers.. As well as cranes, the company provides a range of material handling machinery and highly experienced rigging crews, including certified operators and OEM-qualified service technicians.
The Manitowoc Company, Inc. (“Manitowoc”) was founded in 1902 and has over a 117-year tradition of providing high-quality products and support services that are tailored to customers’ needs. Its 2019 net sales were approximately $1.83 billion. Manitowoc is one of the world's leading providers of engineered lifting solutions. Through its wholly-owned subsidiaries, Manitowoc designs, manufactures, markets and supports comprehensive product lines of mobile telescopic cranes, tower cranes, lattice-boom crawler cranes, boom trucks and industrial cranes under the Grove, Potain, Manitowoc, National Crane, Shuttlelift and Manitowoc Crane Care brand names.