21.09.2022

Haulotte launches ‘Smart Solutions’

Haulotte has launched a new lease type/contract rental initiative in France, Italy and Spain, which combines telematics monitoring, finance solutions and equipment maintenance for a fixed contract term.

Dubbed ‘Haulotte Smart Solutions’ it aims to help manage customer’s fleets, offering fixed monthly payments for between four and six years. Machines are all equipped with the Sherpal telematics which can also help with rental management issues, such as tracking utilisation, rates and returns. Haulotte says that it will handle the entire maintenance management effort, freeing the customer to reduce the number of engineers it needs or the ordering of spare parts, while also handling waste and recycling tasks.

It adds that the ‘Smart’ contract guarantees an intervention by Haulotte experts in less than 48 hours, supported by the Sherpal telematics remote pre-diagnosis of issues.

Vertikal Comment

This looks very much like a full contract rental/Contract Hire package, similar to that used in the van/small truck mounted utility platforms, port crane or automotive markets. However, Haulotte appears to be marketing it to rental companies as well, as a better solution for their fleet management.

A great deal will of course depend on the cost of the package, and the dependability of the support team not to mention how well the telematics system can pick up and anticipate issues before they become a problem. For many companies a 48 hour call out is simply too slow, and could end up with machine swap overs, which adds substantially to the cost.

It could though suit contractors or industrial companies that run extensive fleets.
At the same time if it takes off it will help take away some of the manufacturer’s pain inflicted by the ups and downs of the economic cycle.