Two leading brands have partnered to design, manufacture and sell products throughout North America resulting in over 80% market share among ball screw-driven mobile column lifts.

After being competitors for over 20 years, ARI Hetra and MAHA USA, now announce their partnership to design, manufacture and sell heavy-duty truck maintenance shop equipment in North America. The flagship product for both companies is the mobile column lift (MCL). MCLs have become the preferred solution to lift trucks weighing as much as 150,000 lbs. with any wheelbase or width. As the name implies, mobile column lifts are easily moved between service bays and are purchased at a fraction of the cost of permanently installed drive-on lifts.

Juergen Werner, managing director of MAHA USA, observed that “Together, our companies have tens of thousands of MCLs installed across the continent. Going forward we will be the dominant provider of ball screw-based MCLs in North America, all proudly made in the USA in MAHA’s world-class, ISO 9001:2015 manufacturing facility in Pinckard, AL. By combining our manufacturing operations, we expect improved efficiency and we look forward to greater innovation through combined product development efforts as well.”

The lifts will be sold under the ARI Hetra brand whose bright “safety green” products are recognized throughout the U.S. and Canada. The nation-wide ARI sales and service team will assume responsibility for ongoing support of all MAHA lifts in the market.

MAHA and ARI have more that unites them than divides them. The MCLs and both MAHA USA and ARI Hetra utilize the world’s premier mechanism for linear motion a recirculating ball screw. Gary Hudson, President of ARI Hetra notes, “The recirculating ball screw is truly one of the brilliant inventions of the late 19th century. Ball screw-based MCLs last for decades to nearly zero friction as the lifting mechanism rolls smoothly on hundreds of ball bearings. With no torque or energy wasted on friction, the lifts are eco-friendly and maintenance consists primarily of bi-annual lubrication. The solution also avoids dangerous and costly leaks common to hydraulics.”

Hudson added, “In a way, history repeats itself here as the MCLs of MAHA and ARI both originate from the designs of the same Swiss-German entrepreneur over thirty years ago. Our coming back together was perhaps inevitable. We can think of this as ‘German engineering meets American ingenuity.’ “