Komatsu to begin work on Sudbury hard rock development, test & validation centre

Posted by Paul Moore on 23rd March 2023

In support of its planned strategic growth of the company’s hard rock mining business, Komatsu is investing millions to transform its Sudbury, Ontario, Canada operations. The move supports Komatsu’s strategies of delivering high customer satisfaction while supporting business growth through successful supplier and manufacturing networks. The transformation of Komatsu’s hard rock operations is planned to being in April 2023, and will include:

  • Creation of a new product development, test and validation centre for hard rock underground drilling, LHD and truck products at the company’s location in Sudbury
  • Increasing production capacity for Komatsu OE underground drill products. This includes streamlining the operations for improved safety, quality and lean manufacturing

With the planned investment, Komatsu’s Sudbury facilities it says “will become a centre of industry, technical and operational excellence for the company’s hard rock products. Focus will be on the optimisation of technical product core competencies including engineering, prototyping, testing and validation. Operational efficiencies, capabilities and capacity will also be improved through facility optimisation and further leveraging the company and supplier networks.”

“Our commitment to hard rock mining will only continue to grow as we look to increase product, solution and service offerings for customers,” said Doug Eamer, Senior VP of hard rock mining for Komatsu. “We are excited about the planned investment in Sudbury and the increased use of Komatsu’s network to support this evolution. Our teams remain focused on continuing to provide exceptional products and solutions for our customers.”

Recent additions to the hard rock lineup include the WX03 LHD, a 3 t diesel-powered heavy-duty machine designed for especially small, narrow vein applications with limited manoeuvring space, which was launched in 2022. This followed the launch of the 7 t WX07 LHD in 2020 – developed from the ground up with a whole new chassis, Z-link kinematics, revamped powertrain and optimised ergonomic operator cabin with enhanced visibility to help boost productivity.