Pilot Crushtec started out in 1990 manufacturing Tornado VSI crushers. Chief executive officer, Sandro Scherf, who studied sales and marketing managment, joined his father in an engineering jobbing shop in 1985. “We were manufacturing crushers for a European company and when payments became an issue, we cut ties with them. We were left with a large stockholding of crushers and no customer and decided to try and sell the crushers. It became apparent quickly that there was more money to be made in selling the equipment than in manufacturing it and we sold the jobbing shop and started Pilot Crushtec,” he said.


“We got into exports early on and still export to our first export customer. Incidentally, this customer started building a crusher called a Rubble Master and they are now one of the world’s leading manufacturers of recycling impact crushers. “At that stage we weren’t sure where we were going to go,” he said. “When Nelson Mandela was released in 1990, the market was dead. However, we were very, very optimistic, and despite warnings from our competitors about the market being too small for a second player, we tied up with Finlay Hydrascreens in 1993. Within four months we had sold three machines and by the end of that year, we had sold 12, doubling our original expectations. The Terex Finlay product has grown to be the leading brand in mobile screening,” Scherf confirms.

 

Exports form a major part of the company’s business, and Pilot Crushtec won back-to-back merit awards in the State President’s Awards for Export Achievement in both 1993 and 1994.

 

Pilot Crushtec’s approach of continuous development is supported by its vision of added value services. It has an unlimited research and development budget.

 

In 2004, the company implemented internal restructuring designed to streamline and centralise customer service through the newly established parts division, PartsLink, which supports its product support initiative, SupportLink. These divisions fall under direct management of the sales division and are designed to co-ordinate the respective functions to create greater synergy and improve accountability and customer service.