The order consists of fifty ‘S.BO Express’ semi-trailers with dry freight bodies and twenty-five dollies which connect a pair of trailers to create an extra-long truck-trailer combination (up to a maximum length of 31.5 metres).

Schmitz began production of its own axles at the Altenberge plant in 2004: since then, it has manufactured 2 million of them, installing them on trailers made in Altenberge or shipping them to its other trailer plants in Europe and Turkey.

The American manufacturer announced in September that it is adding two new third-party options to its semi-trailers: a lightweight brake drum from Accuride; and a liftgate battery charger from Schmitz Cargobull’s North American joint venture with Utility.

Since 2020, Bernhard Schmitz has served as CEO and co-founder of a supply chain management firm called Exxcility Business Solutions.

The ‘S.CU dc85’ is the latest model in Schmitz’s range of diesel-powered refrigeration units and is intended to replace the company’s current “top” model, the ‘S.CU 2.0’.

The jury praised the concept of the truck, which was first unveiled at the last IAA Transportation event in 2022: originally called ‘eActros Long Haul’, the idea was to develop a truck capable of covering up to 500 kilometres on a single charge.

In addition to Schmitz products, the new warehouse will also store parts for Berger Fahrzeugtechnik, a specialist in lightweight trailers.

Between 12-13 June, Schmitz Cargobull AG hosted members of the press at its trailer factory in Vreden, located just on the border with the Netherlands. The ostensible reason for our visit was to receive a sneak preview of the company’s newest transport refrigeration product, which will be unveiled at the next IAA Transportation in Hanover: in fact, we learned much more about the company’s plans to expand and modernise its trailer factory, where it produces the ‘S.KO’ refrigerated models and the ‘S.BO’ dry freight range.

The new plant is located next to the Utility Trailer Southeast Texas dealer location and will be operated by ‘Cargobull North America’, the joint venture established by the two companies last year.

Although it is integrating aspects of the two data platforms, Schmitz says AGS will continue to operate independently on the cold chain telematics market.

These 'S.KO COOL' reefers are installed with Schmitz’s ‘S.CU d80’ transport refrigeration units as well as its ‘TrailerConnect’ telematics hardware.

Dr Schweitzer has held the role since 1 September 2021.