With an industrial history of more than 60 years, gigant brings to market a refined selection of axle and suspension systems for Europe’s vast commercial road transport industry. In a concerted effort to maintain pace with such a competitive and innovative sector, gigant appointed a new Managing Director to helm its operations.
Q: Firstly, congratulations on your appointment as Managing Director at gigant. When did you start in this role?
A: I was entrusted with the management of the company gigant Trenkamp & Gehle GmbH in the beginning of last year and officially assumed managing director duties in May 2019.
Q: What were you doing in a professional capacity prior to this appointment?
A: Since 2014 I have been active as Head of Project Management in the KRONE Group, gathering major experience in industrial development projects, such as developing new agricultural machines such as round baler or self-propelled forage harvester. After that I was asked to lead a strategical project in our trailer company dealing with a completely new way of order processing including ongoing organisation changes.
Q: Could you please provide an overview of your career to date in this industry?
A: My professional career started after my studies of Industrial Engineering at the Technical University of Kaiserslautern as a consultant for the automotive industry. During this period, I was involved in several projects, supporting our customers in the areas of engineering, production and after sales.
In 2014 I joined the KRONE Group – the parent group of gigant trailer axles, and manufacturer of agricultural machinery and trailers and semitrailers for road freight transport.
After starting as a project manager at KRONE Green I have been active as Head of Project Management in the KRONE Group up to my current position as Managing Director at gigant.
Q: Are there any projects or goals that you are working towards in 2020?
A: We just started our ambitious new strategy 2020-2025 in which we will try to achieve international expansion for our axles while looking for new opportunities in the DACH/Benelux area. Our widespread fame in accordance with optimising our product portfolio will help us achieving our goals.
Q: Is gigant preparing anything special for the next IAA Commercial Vehicles Show?
A: We will focus more on our value-add services as a company, particularly our service network.
Q: Has there been any new developments with gigant self-steering axles, disc brake swing axles and low bed trailer suspension?
A: We are continually improving our products, with an eye for total cost of ownership, introducing, for example, low maintenance steering axles.
Q: Have you observed any trends or challenges in the commercial vehicle industry that gigant is addressing or aims to address?
A: We will look at tire pressure systems and increased load capacity for our swing axles from 10 to 12 tonnes.
