Swedish reman expert knows how to handle ‘smart’ cars

Sweden – There are around six million cars on Sweden’s roads today. Meanwhile, stricter regulations and a surge in eco-entrepreneurialism have enabled remanufacturing to blossom countrywide, says Göran Andersson of remanufacturing firm Megalans. His business caters specifically to original equipment manufacturers such as Volvo Cars.

In the remanufacturing business, Andersson explains, no two days are the same. ‘On average, we send out around 350 remanufactured units a week. But what we are working on differs greatly.’

Megalans employs a team of 30 ‘highly skilled’ people who professionally dismantle and test all the individual parts of the incoming equipment, including the software, says Andersson, who himself is a trained engineer. He adds: ‘Our operation is pretty much like a production process, only at the end-of-life phase.’

‘Back in the day, we started out with car radios,’ Andersson says with a laugh. ‘Remember those? Car electronics were hardly an issue at that time because pretty much the only piece of electronics was that little radio. So much has changed. Now we handle mostly infotainment systems – and we also produce spare parts for some of our clients.’

Andersson points out that today, virtually everything they put in a car operates via sensors – from parking sensors to vehicle speed sensors. ‘It is a very long list!’ A decided benefit of this sharp upsurge in car electronics and mechatronics is that ‘possibilities to attract new business are very promising’, so the ceo says.

He is already looking forward to remanufacturing the much discussed self-driving car, as pioneered by Volvo in the Swedish city of Gothenburg, where Megalans is located. ‘We’re talking about really expensive and high-tech equipment,’ notes Andersson, who is sure innovative car options like ”autopilot” will likely ‘shape the future of the automotive industry’.

A company profile about Megalans will be featured in the November issue of Recycling International.