Kamstrup opened a new water meter production facility in Roswell, Ga. Feb. 8. The manufacturing facility will bring more than 50 jobs to the U.S. to make water meters for utilities throughout the country.
For a look at the ribbon cutting ceremony, watch WWD’s Facebook Live video of the event.
Kamstrup CEO Kim Lehmann took pride in opening a facility in the U.S., noting it will provide jobs to the area and offer faster service to customers.
"Today, Kamstrup establishes its first production of intelligent water meters outside Denmark with the potential to supply all of America from Roswell [Ga.]," Lehmann said. "Here, American labor will work side by side with robots producting high quality water meters that will help identify non-revenue water from Californai to Boston, from Canada to Chile."
The automated machines that construct meters from the beginning of the process to the end have not yet been fully installed, but machines to customize the look and logos of the meters are up and running. When the full production line up is installed, cellphones will not be allowed into the production room due to interference with automated processes used to make the water meters.
Kamstrup production worker explains factory's automated processes at grand opening Feb. 8.
Until the full scale production is in place, prouction operators take water meters produced overseas in the Danish production facility and place them in a customizer machine process. Logos and other information are installed on the water meters with a semi-automated process. Workers move the finished water meters to a packaging machine before they ultimately box them up and ship them to customers.
With this facility’s location in the U.S. Kamstrup intends to host educational sessions and tours of the fnished water meter manufacturing plant for municipalities and utilities. The Georgia factory will also make order fulfillment easier and more efficient for U.S.-based customers while increasing production capacity for Kamstrup.
Danish Ambassador to the U.S. Lars Gert Lose speaks with attendees of the Kamstrup factory grand opening in Roswell, Ga., Feb. 8.
Danish Ambassador to the U.S. Lars Gert Lose highlighted Denmark's efforts in reducing water loss around the globe and the implications opening a factory in the U.S. will have on the country's water utilities.
"Between 25 to 50% of water is lost due to bad metering, aging infrastructure and leakages. The numbers are better in the U.S., it's down 16 percent loss; the good news is that of those 16%, 67% are recoverable if yu have the right technology," Lose said. "We are very much looking forward to a stronger partnership with the U.S. in the future on handling water. Side by side with Kamstrup we will deliver the technology that we need and I think wer are already seeing some promising results here."
This article was updated Feb. 12, 2018 at 3:45 p.m.
