The recent appointment of Servotech (Pty) Ltd. as Wacker Neuson’s first dealer in KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) has boosted the global construction equipment and compact machine manufacturing specialist’s Southern African dealer network to a solid sixteen.

Established in 2012, Servotech, a leading rental company, offers equipment hire, sales, repairs and service solutions to agriculture, construction, manufacturing, mining, and marine as well as to municipalities across KZN. “We also supply top-quality equipment from our 900msq premises in Phoenix, Durban, to the rest of Africa,” notes Neresh Maganlal, owner of Servotech. From humble beginnings with only two employees and five pieces of equipment, Servotech today boasts a staff complement of seventeen and a fleet of 520! “Our ‘simply remarkable service’ philosophy which is intrinsic to all our products and services has played a key role in the company’s success journey.” 

Since its inception, Servotech has been a strong supporter of the Wacker Neuson brand. “In addition to being well acquainted with our products, Servotech’s sound industry reputation, solid customer base and broad industry network, prompted our decision to appoint this well-established company on 18th June 2019 as our non-exclusive dealer in KZN,” says Dennis Vietze, Managing Director of Wacker Neuson Sub-Saharan Africa.

“Our partnership with Servotech ideally positions Wacker Neuson to offer our world-class product and service suite directly to our KZN customers,” continues Vietze. “Furthermore, the Servotech sales force and customer representation team give us additional personnel to service our existing customer base and introduce our brand into Servotech’s established customer portfolio.

This means that our customers can now benefit from greater accessibility to the Wacker Neuson range of products, spares and workshop turnaround times.” Vietze adds that as Servotech is a preferred supplier of many government organisations, this new dealer agreement opens the door for Wacker Neuson into a sector that previously proved difficult for the company to penetrate on a direct basis.

This new dealer agreement will see the expansion of Servotech’s current fleet of nineteen Wacker Neuson units to include most of the brand’s Light Equipment (LE) range. “Servotech has always prided itself in teaming up with some of the most trusted international brands and our collaboration with Wacker Neuson as a world-renowned leader in the construction and LE space, simply reinforces the fact that we only deal with the best,” affirms Maganlal who has worked with the Wacker Neuson brand for close on 30 years.

“Wacker Neuson undoubtedly has some of the best and highest standard of equipment in its range and we are extremely proud to be able to deliver these high calibre solutions to our customers.” He points out that rammers and high frequency pokers are the most popular amongst Servotech customers who are already familiar with the Wacker Neuson brand and who insist on this high quality equipment.

With trained technicians, a fully equipped workshop and a sizeable stockholding of parts to support its existing agencies, Servotech will undertake all after-sales responsibilities, supported by Wacker Neuson.

The Wacker Neuson KZN Branch, spearheaded by Graham Gadd, will continue to deal directly with our existing Hire segment customers. The end user customers will be channelled through Servotech in collaboration with Wacker Neuson. Gadd confirms that the Wacker Neuson branch will continue to assist with the supply of spares and technical support as well as new customer referrals.

According to Servotech Sales Manager, Meshach Nadasan, excellent after-sales service goes hand-in-hand with training to ensure correct machine use for extended life span, operator safety and reduced maintenance costs. Subsequently, Servotech customers receive regular training on operator usage as well as on equipment servicing and repairs.

Due to the longstanding relationship between the two companies, a number of Servotech’s technical employees have already attended training at the Wacker Neuson KZN Branch. In line with this new dealer agreement, all relevant employees will now also receive regular in-house training.

Looking to a productive and lucrative future, Maganlal says that despite a slowing down in turnover caused by macro-economic factors, Servotech has risen above these challenges and is showing steady growth. “KZN holds the lion share of government spend and our strong ties with various municipalities bode well for us.”

Ending on a positive note, Vietze says, “Not only will this game-changing partnership with Servotech further strengthen our extensive dealer network across South Africa and our neighbouring countries of Namibia, Botswana, Zimbabwe and Mozambique, but it will also serve to assist our valued customers in taking their businesses to greater heights.”