LiuGong has formed a new international team responsible for developing its quarry and aggregate business. Leading the team is John Calder, director of quarry and aggregates.

Mr Calder has worked with LiuGong for the last two years in product support and brings extensive industry experience. He previously worked at International Harvester in Australia for five years, then joined Caterpillar in Geneva, Switzerland where he held a number of senior international positions in marketing, sales and dealer development over a 30-year career. 

The new team will focus on ‘back to basics’, lowering quarry and aggregate customers’ costs and making them more productive and more profitable. “Based on feedback from many customers, the competition seems to be doing it the other way around, so we see great potential to grow internationally,’ said Mr Calder. “Our strategy is simple and is based on going back to four basic critical success factors: people, product, parts and service, and price.” 

According to LiuGong, its new international team is also multicultural, able to converse in 10 different languages and consists of deep subject matter experts with sales, marketing, product development, product support, rental and used, finance and dealer development backgrounds. ‘Their primary role will be to work side by side with global dealers to ensure their teams are well trained and focused on the specific needs of quarry and aggregate customers,” stated the company.

Kevin Thieneman, vice president of LiuGong Machinery said, “By focusing on the unique requirements of our quarry and aggregates customers, we want to develop enduring partnerships. John and his team are a great addition to LiuGong and are well placed to help LiuGong develop and maintain long-term relationships in this industry segment.”