HIGH PROFILE
The mills that have survived
are likely to hang on now and will most likely move onto bigger and better things
JoeScan staff (L-R) Fabian Hohmuth (Senior Software Engineer), Kris Arellano (Assembly Tech), Joey Nelson (President), Vadim Kovalev (Assembly Tech), Amy Seibel (Office Manager) , and Gagan Nijjar (Design Engineer)
We thought we’d attack those areas – our products were going to be simpler, lower cost and as reliable as possible
largely bigger sawmills who could afford scanning technology and mostly for cutting value optimisation. The feedback we have received is that JoeScan has helped enable smaller sawmills to use good quality scanning technology and increased use of scanning for size control applications. Previously in North America it was big softwood mills that were the
primary users of scanning systems but with the cost coming down there has been a lot more penetration in smaller hardwood mills and also internationally with systems going to places like Australia, New Zealand and South America.
IFI: What do you see as the major challenge facing scanning technology suppliers right now? JN: Our continual challenge is that we’re a small segment inside of sensor and camera technology. It can be hard for us to keep up and implement new technology available in the broader sector into our systems – it’s constantly changing. We’re always concerned about new technologies from outside that changes the way
Joey takes some feedback from the sawmill
things are done and being able to move with that. If at all possible, JoeScan needs to be the one who brings in something new and changes the dynamic but it is a challenge dealing with that consistent pressure. I’m young so have a little bit of an advantage in keeping my finger on the pulse as technology evolves but as the business grows it becomes increasingly difficult to move quickly. That’s one of the main reasons we’ve intentionally kept the core group of staff at JoeScan as small as is realistic – we have just the five full-time staff with us that we chose carefully and who understand what the company is about. We’ll never grow for growth’s sake – we’re pretty sensible about that.
IFI: What about challenges for the overall sawmilling sector? JN: Right now it’s looking better – I think it’s at the bottom. Mills are still seeing continued challenges. International demand is driving up log prices, and while the housing market has been recovering, the recovery doesn’t seem to be in any hurry. The downturn hit so hard and so dramatically that a lot of mills stopped buying even the things they absolutely needed just because they didn’t know if they were going to be around in three months and, to be honest, some of them were right – a lot of those mills have now shut down. The interesting thing is that it was the mills that didn’t have technology, the mills that were way behind the technology curve, that were the ones to shut down.
OCTOBER/NOVEMBER 2011 | International Forest Industries 23
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