Hitachi Sets Its Sights On The North American Market

By Steve Fiscor, editor-in-chief, Coal Age

Hitachi Construction Machinery Americas (HCMA) hosted a dealer meeting recently in Atlanta, Ga., where the company discussed its plans to rebrand as LANDCROS, and an ambitious goal to firmly establish itself as the No. 3 original equipment manufacturer (OEM) serving open-pit mines in North America by 2030. Success would mean acquiring enough market share to supplant Liebherr.

In February 2022, Hitachi Construction Machinery dissolved its joint venture with John Deere and began operating independently as HCMA. “We successfully achieved our goal for this major transformation in North America, which was to operate the business ourselves and interact directly with customers and dealers,” said HCMA Chairman, CEO Hidehiko “Matt” Matsui. “Now, we aim to become a true Tier 1 OEM in the world’s largest market. This initiative has grown into something far larger and better than we had envisioned when we first discussed the strategy in Tokyo.”

Hitachi Construction Machinery considers North America a critical region for its global success and the company said it is committed to strengthening its products for its dealers and partners. “I’m proud of what we have achieved together so far, and I am very excited about the future as LANDCROS,” Matsui said.

The company will rebrand as LANDCROS in April 2027. “The new brand combines our vision of prosperous Land with the values we cherish: Customer, Reliable, Open, and Solutions, and expresses our mission to co-create innovative products, services and solutions, and together we will continue to create new value,” said Masafumi Senzaki, president and COO, Hitachi Construction Machinery. “These include our Japanese-originated manufacturing capability, our global sales and service capability, and our open co-creation capability.”

To establish a clear No.3 position by 2030, Hitachi Construction Machinery has set four priorities: grow its North American mining and construction business, build its mining business throughout the Americas and Africa, establish foundations for further growth in Latin America, and improve its parts and service business.

“We have successfully completed the first phase of our journey, and now we are entering the second phase of growth,” Senzaki said. “LANDCROS will create customer value with safer operations, higher productivity and lower lifecycle costs.

“North America is our top priority,” he said. “The next phase of growth starts here. And, we are all-in!”

Senzaki has set a goal for LANDCROS to grow its mining business revenues from $2.8 billion today to $4.7 billion by 2030. He also expects the company to triple its Latin American business from $300 million today to $1 billion by 2030.

“From this point forward, we are LANDCROS,” said HCMA COO, Simon Wilson. “We’re excited for the future. By 2030, we will retake our No. 3 position. We’re almost doubling the size of the mining organization as we move forward. We want to make sure that we’re supporting the dealers and be able to support the customers properly. We want to keep Liebherr from further penetrating the mining business.”

Growing haul truck sales is a priority for HCMA, and the group is considering production and sales of 100-ton units for the longer term. “The demand for 100-ton trucks is increasing globally, not only in the USA, and we are fully aware of this,” Wilson said. “Two OEMs dominate this market, so we will need to produce a strong product to enter this market. The engineers in Japan are looking at payload, faster speed on grade and, of course, a lower TCO.”

The company recently announced its intention to partner with Pronto for an autonomous haulage system (AHS), which would complement the O (open) in LANDCROS. Pronto has been installing AHS on articulated haulers operating at quarries. The partnership with HCM would be a leap for them. The first Pronto AHS system may be installed on a Hitachi mining class haul truck.

“That is what we are discussing with Pronto today,” Wilson said. “We know Pronto has opportunities with other OEMs. Several customers have indicated an interest in AHS, and we want to be in alignment with them.”

Scaling Up to Meet North American Demand

The USA and Canada have placed a priority on mining, and both countries have accelerated approval timelines for new mines. Hitachi Construction Machinery will need to scale up quickly to meet this demand, especially with haul trucks. “With production in Japan and North America, we have a dual strategy to supply the mining market,” Wilson said. HCMA is building trucks again at its Hitachi Truck Manufacturing (HTM) facility in Guelph, Ontario, Canada.

“We have an established pipeline for shovels,” Wilson said. “The truck side of the business is a little more challenging, as they are purchased in multiple quantities. The dual strategy will allow us to supply the West Coast from Japan, while managing the opportunities in eastern Canada with the HTM facility.”

“We have plenty of productive capacity in Japan, and we will not hesitate to invest here in North America if the customer requirement is here,” Senzaki said. “Equipment supply has not been an issue; the focus for us is with product support.”

“Rather than investing in large regional warehouses, we will ensure our large mining dealers, like Wajax and Arnold Machinery, have the necessary components in stock to support the mines,” Wilson said. “It’s all about product support.” Wilson also sees potential growth opportunities for remanufacturing components as well as using HCM partners, like HE Parts and others, for certain components.

“It’s an exciting time for the mining industry in North America,” said Mike Whitelock, director of mining for HCMA. “We are now seeing more opportunity in front of us than we have ever seen before.”

As part of the LANDCROS open philosophy, HCM has announced a couple of key partnerships for the mining business, Whitelock explained. “The first was with Rythmic, a Canadian predictive analytics company with an established marketplace, where we bring forward a collaborative approach to next generation remote monitoring and remote analysis capabilities to predict machine faults before they happen,” he said. “The most recent one was the announcement with Pronto in the autonomy space, which will provide an accelerator toward the interoperability with AHS. Interoperability is a goal for many mine operators.”

HCMA restarted haul truck production at the HTM facility, and the plant has several 326-ton EH5000AC-3 haul trucks on the assembly line. “By the end of FY2026, HTM will have produced probably 20 trucks,” Whitelock said.

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