Systems Sunlight, the world's third biggest maker of batteries for fork lift trucks, is building a new assembly line in Italy to get closer to its customers as part of a plan to challenge its main US rivals in the fast-growing European market.
The company competes with EnerSys and Exide Technologies but says its factory in Xanthi, northern Greece, is not ideally positioned to pursue a new strategy centred on Europe's big fork-lift makers. Its new plant in Verona, northern Italy, will be the company's first offshore assembly line and is expected to be ready in May and start taking orders in June, Chief Executive Officer Vasili Billis told Reuters.
Systems Sunlight has previously focused on supplying the market for replacement batteries but last year it decided to build the plant in Italy to sell batteries directly to big fork-lift manufacturers, such as US- based Hyster-Yale Materials Handling, Billis said.