Our customer, one of the highest selling soft drinks in history, is focused on continuous growth by leveraging the scale and reach of the brand. In the Philippines, the customer currently has 19 production plants, and is pursuing reinforcement of five other major plants (two in South Luzon and three in Mindanao) by installing four additional returnable glass bottle lines and two more PET bottle lines. This strategy aims to increase production capacity by at least 20%, thereby opening opportunities for growth for our lubrication business.
For the last three years, Connell PH and KLSEA have been consistently working to offer our food-grade machine lubrication solution and support the customer’s growth strategy by promoting compliance with food safety and helping them increase their machine reliability to drive production efficiency. Proving that Klüber Lubrication is the most reliable partner to achieve their growth targets, they have exclusively tapped on us to provide our products and services for their expansion lines.
However, the COVID-19 pandemic has indeed challenged the way we execute things for the customer. Because of the limited mobility brought about by the travel restrictions, lubrication mapping activities were done remotely. Thanks to the expertise of Mr. Callum Macleod and Mr. Tyrone Malalad, the dedication of Mr. Euclid Kirby Tam and Mr. Jerome Faustino from Connell PH, and the full cooperation of the customer’s Reliability team, that they were able to sustain the communication through weekly virtual meetings and deliver the results on time. As to date, the new lines in Davao 2, Zamboanga and Misamis Oriental plants are already geared towards fully operating by 2nd quarter of 2021 and will be running with Klüber Lubrication.
These small success stories have even opened more doors for us to introduce our KlüberEfficiencyManager App. Currently, we are already doing pilot runs in their Sta. Rosa Plant, through the support of Mr. Dennis Klamer of KLM. We are looking forward to see how this will take our partnership with the customer to greater heights, both locally and globally.
Written by:
Ms. Lara Jimenez & Mr. Jerome Faustino
Connell Philippines
