Company Rescue

The troubled Swedish robotics company, Sky Park AB, have approached us to advise and assist in the restructuring of the company following a rescue acquisition by an international consortium.

By the time we arrive (May 2000) the company headquarters will already have been transferred from Stockholm to the factory at Vattholma, so our first task will be to investigate and report with recommendations regarding office management systems and procedures, factory risk assessment procedures, quality control systems, quality assurance systems, supply chain streamlining, improving efficiency, value engineering, facilities management, copyright and patent protection systems and so forth.

Sky Park AB
Grev Turegatan 19
PO Box 5817
102 48  STOCKHOLM
Sweden
Tel: +46-8-662 39 95
Fax: +46-8-665 19 11
A WONDERFUL CONCEPT:
The company designs, manufactures and builds fully automated car parks. A garage door opens as the customer drives up and parks. The customer takes a ticket and leaves. The door closes and the car is rotated on a turntable. Another door opens and a robot lifts the car from the turntable into the car park steelwork grid where it is moved horizonatally to a vertical transportation lift and then whisked by robot at speed along the horizontal to a bay. When the customer returns and inserts the ticket and payment, the robot is directed back to the car’s bay and the procedure is reversed, delivering the car in under 3 minutes. The customer enters when the door opens and simply drives out and away. No people enter the car park — so the car doesn’t have to be locked, and the car park does not have to be serviced with lights, heating, ventilation, toilets, stairs, lifts etc. (making it very cheap to run). Not having drive ramps means more efficient use of the plot — and more car parking spaces, and more efficientive in general as people never have to search for a parking space or for a lost vehicle, nor is there any feeling of threat or danger. The design is extremely flexible – from all on one level to high rise or all below ground.

2001-06 Edit: After a month of systematic investigation, we provided our recommendations to the board. Our main recommendation was to relocate the business outside Sweden. We were asked to continue developing and supporting Vattholma until operational contractual obligations were fulfilled. Our contract (ref 45) was renewed under our ref 46, and our remit later extended to include work from the UK on a retainer and ad-hoc basis. In Vattholma, we actively assisted in setting up many of the systems and procedures we had recommended. We developed a bilingual company intranet, and worked closely with Castle Computer Consultants Ltd. of Durham in developing basic IT and telephony systems, including the acquisition of multilingual software. We standardised all documentation (forms, ledgers, filing, letterheads, etc), and set up translation procedures for technical specifications and business contract documentation — in general — and specifically for the SCI Cartier Fondation Car Nouveau Parking Automatique a Paris.

2003-09 Edit: We can confirm that the company did cut its ties with Sweden in favour of a UK base for its international operations. The company is no longer “Sky Park AktieBolag”, but Skyparks International Limited of Edinburgh.

• www.skyparks.com (Flash Intro)
• www.skyparks.com (Normal)
• www.scanweld.se

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