THE INTERVIEW | SERGIO ROBLEDO
After a decade of successful operations in the US, GH Cranes established its Texas footprint with a large new facility.
sold well it proved that the market could handle a broader range of components, so another ten were added to the portfolio. “Then suddenly you are talking to companies
like Embraer, Brazil’s leading manufacturer of planes and one of the world leaders in the aerospace industry. So, in 2003, a big client changed the game for us and became a great reference for other customers.” That surge in demand meant that Robledo had
to oversee a period of rapid growth, bring in more local sales people and build a network of trusted sales and service personnel. GH steadily grew state by state across Brazil but never rushed. “The key is finding a way to grow steadily and
not too fast, but also not too slow,” adds Robledo. “You need to find the rhythm of growth.” Eventually, GH was manufacturing so many cranes in Brazil, working with three different manufacturing partners, that it needed to build its own plant. The parent company took a risk and invested heavily in a new manufacturing site, which opened in 2011. Since then, it has gone from strength to strength and it continues to grow to this day, though Robledo has since moved on to head the company’s US operations. From being its sole employee in 2001, he left
in 2015 to come to the US and start over again, leaving behind an operation of 100 people, one of the leading overhead crane manufacturers in Brazil.
Moving stateside
By that time, Robledo had a new set of priorities, first and foremost his family.
“My wife is Brazilian and we have two kids. Having kids changed the game for me. Kids don’t walk to school in Brazil because it is not safe. It is a country that is fun when you are single and surfing, but when you have kids, you want to give them a better future. Brazil is amazing but it can also be dangerous, so coming to the US was the right move. “I knew that a project in the US was going on, and it was similar to what had happened in Brazil, so I asked my wife if she was ready for another challenge. I came to Texas for a weekend and saw that it was a great place with very nice people who are polite, educated and welcoming. The experience here has been great.” Once again, GH started small. It had identified a partner in the US and was pursuing the same strategy of selling components to other crane manufacturers. The owner of one dealer in Texas was getting ready to sell his company. He was in his 70s and his kids did not want to take over the business, so GH bought it and started looking for someone to handle the transition. Robledo applied for the job, spoke to the Guerra family and they accepted because they knew how successful he had been in Brazil. If Bilbao to Brazil had been a culture shock, so was moving to Dallas.
“I can only explain it like this – in Brazil they have samba, in the US we have Metallica. That is the difference. It is not that one is better than the other, they are just different,” he says. “Life is fast-paced here, and people have
strong personalities, so I had to get used to that. If someone asks for a quote they expect it the next day, but in Brazil they can wait maybe ten days. If Americans have a good idea, they just want to get on and do it. That is great, but it took a lot of getting used to. For someone from Spain who then lived in Brazil, coming to the US can be overwhelming.” Despite the dramatic change in his
surroundings and the need to shift gears to acclimatise to the different pace of life in Texas, Robledo did not take too long to integrate. The fact that GH managed to find its way smoothly into the US market no doubt helped. Taking a similar pathway as it had in Brazil, the company took its time to study the market, find its opening and let demand drive its growth. In 2025, GH had reached the point where it no longer had sufficient capacity to manufacture enough components to meet demand at the relatively small site that had been run by the company it acquired ten years previously, so it invested heavily in a huge new facility, from which it supplies some of the biggest companies in the US. Its supply network is already nationwide, but it continues to expand its footprint little by little.
ochmagazine.com | Spring 2026 29
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