The Man of Steel doesn’t stop developing.

    Steel Solutions BV

Steel Solutions separates Meuse Terminals and continues to develop itself as a chain director.   The Man of Steel doesn’t stop developing.   Steel Solutions knows where the business is done in the land of steel. This chain director currently has the international steel industry as its playfield, an annual 1,5 billion ton industry. The company makes good use of challenges and chances  which are offered by the changing steel industry. But it must be said that these chances lie elsewhere in Europe, rather than just the Netherlands and rather than just Maastricht, which is still the largest concentration of steel companies of the country.       Because of the growth in our role as chain director which conducts business in the world wide steel industry, a whole new global work terrain has developed, sketches Director Wibo Feijen. Steel- Solutions has gone through some turbulent developments in the past years. “Our new business concept depends less on the capacity of our terminals in Maastricht because we are now collaborating with terminals in the rest of Europe and beyond. This means that we have to create a new future for our own terminals. It would be a shame to reserve this available storage and transhipment capacity solely for the steel industry, especially now that the import of steel to Europe is left behind. That why we decided use our terminals for other purposes rather than our own company. A new company, Maasterminal Maastricht BV will make these terminals accessible for third parties who are looking for smart multimodal solutions in the region. Steel Solutions continues to develop itself in the niche market for steel, where clients  like to do business with us, “The Men of Steel”.   Maasterminal Maastricht. In Maasterminal Maastricht BV, both of the Steel Solutions’ terminals at the Ankerkade are incorporated. These terminals account for 20.000 m2 of storage capacity, transhipment and VAL activities. They are located near the Juliana canal with covered docks and railway connection. Maasterminal Maastricht BV will be offerings its terminals across sectors. “We are continuing to specialize in logistics”, says current Director Operations Gijs van Lier, who will running this company. “The opportunities to bundle the logistics of different kind of products, we hope that we will be working with different companies, add value in the entire logistics chain and give the terminals a new future as logistical link between diverse modalities.

Quick scan.   The market’s problem. >> It will take years before the demand of steel products on the European markets will rise again. The European Steel industry thus faces huge overcapacities. Apart from that are clients constantly increasing their demands regarding costs, efficiency and stock. Smart direction requires to value added services in the logistics chain.   Our vision. >> Optimisation of the supply chain is the factor of success to be able to grow in the steel business. We have to develop innovative products and services in order to develop in new markets.   Our solutions. >> Steel solutions will continue to develop in the worldwide (super smart) chain direction of steel. The tested recipe of the bundling of steel suppliers has proven to be successful. This recipe will be extended with other products and goods, rather than just steel product, under the new Maasterminal Maastricht BV.

Logistics Day Limburg 2013, Steel-Solutions represented.

Steel-solutions B.V.

The 10^th of October 2013 was the day of “Logistics Day Limburg”. This years’ theme was the Logistics Labour Market. This makes it no coincidence that the province launches it “Human Capital Agenda Logistics Limburg”. An interesting event which was visited by Steel-Solutions Operational Director Gijs van Lier. The location this year was theatre “De Maaspoort” in Venlo.

There was a busy schedule for this interesting day. There was a large collaboration with schools from the entire region that provide logistics studies. Fonthys Hogeschool, Zuyd Hogeschool, Open University and the Maastricht University all participated.

The day started off with several presentations, concerning a wide range of topics. “The international chain of fresh products”, “Sustainable operational excellence, communities of practice”, “Fleet management and telematics services” and “Fresh and green retailing, consumer behaviour in the supply chain”.

After a lunch, the program continued with a short clip, made by Logistics students. Something that stood out in this clip was the small amount of female students in the Logistics branch, one to be exact. The only girl that was displayed on the big screen, made Steel-Solutions proud. It was none other than Steel-Solutions’ own Logistics intern Tanita Kawade. She has been an intern at Steel-Solutions B.V.  since February 2012 and is motivated to learn everything there is to know about logistics and warehousing. Her ambition is to grow into a warehouse manager and she is well on her way at Steel-Solutions.

Than it was time for the launch of “Human Capital Agenda Logistics Limburg” including a panel discussion. After that, representatives of several HCA projects shared their knowledge. Some of the on-going projects concerned;

-          Customs and trace compliance in the inland.

-          Orientation program for school dropouts; a program which enables better throughput of human capital between jobs and study programs.

-          Exploiting and maintaining human capital

-          Strengthening (eu)regional knowledge.

Iinteresting project that focus on logistics of goods and knowledge and the development of human capital, without which a logistics company could not exist. And the market situation indicates that this human capital is not being used to its full potential. A lot of truck drivers are sitting at home, waiting for the economy to rise again. When that happens, there will be too little people to work in the logistics sector. “Logistics is not sexy enough” is the message. The image of logistics should change so that people are motivated to work in the branch. The first changes have already been made in the base of the (future) work, the education. Schools realise how important it is that enough people get motivated to satisfy the future needs of Logistics. Steel-Solutions has acknowledged this for years. For many years we have been working with study-projects  for youngsters and do we offer an interesting and challenging place for graduates. It is good to see that Steel-Solutions is contributing already to making Logistics more interesting for future graduates and has learned a lot from this day. All in all it was an interesting day to attend for Steel-Solutions.