Volvo Construction Equipment has purchased a majority stake in Dutch firm Limach, a manufacturer of electric excavators. The deal will enable Volvo to rapidly expand its electrified machinery portfolio, adding to the five electric compact machines currently available.
The internal combustion engine on select Volvo wheeled and tracked excavators will be replaced by a Limach-developed electrification kit. The current range extends from the compact E18.3 electric mini excavator with an operating range of 3,990 pounds to the 30,864-pound E140.1.
Volvo says the investment complements its long-term electrification roadmap and will provide customers with more solutions to meet their emissions reduction goals.
“Working together, and with our combined customer base, opens opportunities for co-learning and expanding experiences of these types of solutions, as we continue driving the transformation toward sustainable power sources,” says Thomas Bitter, head of technology at Volvo CE.
“Limach was established with the purpose to develop construction equipment with an electric drive. Each machine is custom-made at our production facility in Ede in the Netherlands and delivered according to customer specifications,” says Rens de Bruijn, CEO at Limach. “Since the development of our first demonstrator excavator in 2017, we have seen growing demand from customers in the Netherlands. Thanks to the investment from Volvo CE, we can scale up production of our electric excavators and extend the range we offer to meet this growing appetite for electric drives.”
Limach will continue to operate as a standalone company.