“Our Solutions Help Our Customers Build A Better World”: Caterpillar Inc.

The history of Caterpillar is all about doing: creating, building, problem solving, innovating, testing, servicing and improving. Caterpillar’s ingenious machines from the rich heritage, and more importantly, the people who founded and built the company one breakthrough at a time made the company stronger. Beginning with Benjamin Holt and Clarence Leo Best, usually known as C. L. Best, the people of Caterpillar have always been – and continue to be – extraordinary.

In April 15, 1925, the pioneering tractor company executive, Clarence Leo Best merged with the market leader ‘Holt Caterpillar’ to form the ‘Caterpillar Tractor Co.’ With passing time Caterpillar Tractor Co. expanded its arena and conquered almost every possible field in the arena of Construction Equipment Manufacturing.

It’s been more than 90 years; Caterpillar Inc. has been making sustainable progress possible and driving positive change on every continent. Customers turn to Caterpillar to help them develop infrastructure, energy and natural resource assets.

With 2016 sales and revenues of $38.537 billion, Caterpillar is the world’s leading manufacturer of construction and mining equipment, diesel and natural gas engines, industrial gas turbines and diesel-electric locomotives.

The king of manufacturers

Caterpillar is the world’s leading manufacturer of construction and mining equipment, diesel and natural gas engines, industrial gas turbines and diesel-electric locomotives. The world leader prides itself in having the largest global presence in the industries it serves.

The enterprise’s strategy focuses on solutions to help its customers build a better world and allows Caterpillar to deliver profitable growth for its shareholders.

With its values as a foundation, the company leverages an information-driven approach — the Operating & Execution Model — to guide its decision-making process and ultimately, position itself for continued profitable growth. Caterpillar is committed to understanding the needs of its customers, and together with its partners, delivering industry-leading products and services that are largely focused in three areas:

• Building upon the core competencies of operational excellence — safety, quality, Lean and competitive cost discipline — to increase the advantage.
• Expanding the offerings to enable customer success through integrated and differentiated solutions.
• Growing the reliance on services with a focus on digital-enabled solutions and aftermarket to increase customer loyalty and further strengthen the relationships with its customers.

“Caterpillar’s reputation is one of our greatest assets. We all share the responsibility to protect it – every day. We have earned our solid reputation by developing, building and delivering great products and services and by acting according to the highest ethical standards,” said the CEO, Caterpillar, Inc.

Building Better

Caterpillar’s customers always rely on the company’s products to advance sustainable progress and improve living standards. This commitment to better extends to the organization where it strives to be a model for environmental stewardship and social responsibility.

The Caterpillar Foundation: WE CANNOT ALLEVIATE POVERTY ALONE

The Caterpillar Foundation believes that no organization or individual can end extreme poverty. That’s why it created Together.Stronger.

Together.Stronger. is a collaborative approach to social change, where all types of organizations work together to address the root causes of global systemic problems, like poverty. The platform has united business, non-profits, governments and citizens and combined their strengths to help 50 million people rise out of poverty by 2020.

With the motto “TOGETHER IS HOW WE WORK. STRONGER IS WHY WE WORK.” And with the hashtag #TogetherStronger, the Caterpillar Foundation is spreading awareness around the clock and around the globe to unite and help throw poverty out.

Sustainability: BUILDING A BETTER WORLD

At Caterpillar, sustainability is the commitment to build a better world. Sustainability is the part of what is Caterpillar, Inc and what it does every single day. The company recognizes progress involves a balance of environmental stewardship, social responsibility and economic growth.

Caterpillar consider this as it work towards a vision of a world in which people’s basic needs – such as shelter, clean water, education and reliable energy – are fulfilled. It provides work environments, products, services and solutions that make productive and efficient use of resources as the company strives to achieve its vision. The manufacturing leader believes that this commitment supports the enduring success of its customers, stockholders, dealers and its people.

Vision, Mission, Strategy, & Principles, these are the four biggest assets that keep the company strong all the time.

The vision is a world in which all people’s basic needs – such as shelter, clean water, sanitation, food and reliable power – are fulfilled in an environmentally sustainable way and a company that improves the quality of the environment and the communities where it lives and work.

The mission is to enable economic growth through infrastructure and energy development, and to provide solutions that support communities and protect the planet.

The strategy is to provide work environments, products, services and solutions that make productive and efficient use of resources as it strives to achieve its vision.

Caterpillar Inc. applies innovation and technology to improve the sustainability performance of Caterpillar’s products, services, solutions and operations. It believes that sustainable progress is made possible by developing better systems that maximize life cycle benefits, while also minimizing the economic, social and environmental costs of ownership.

The manufacturing king has three principles that guide its commitment to make sustainable progress possible.

• Prevent Waste by improving the efficiency of its products, processes, services and solutions, not only reducing cost, but also minimizing use of materials, energy, water and land. The company also minimizes impacts to the environment and communities.
• Improve Quality beyond its processes, products, services, solutions, and improves quality of life for its employees, its customers and the quality of the communities and the environment in which Caterpillar operates.
• Develop Better Systems that integrate and optimize resources. Caterpillar keeps resources in the value chain through a circular flow of materials, energy and water, and maximizes the life cycle benefits of resources, while minimizing their economic, social and environmental costs.

CATERPILLAR INNOVATION

Caterpillar’s employees have turned their passion for product development into innovations that create customer value and make the world a better place.

Customer solutions: AGE OF SMART IRON

What was important then is even more important now, in an age where advancements come faster and more frequently than ever before. An age where connectivity drives productivity and the industries evolves. This is the Age of Smart Iron.

From its very first tractor to Cat Minestar, Cat Connect and entire fleets that speak the same language, Caterpillar has spent over 90 years committed to innovation and technology that help its customers succeed.

Co-create: OPEN INNOVATION

Caterpillar is harnessing the power of open innovation by adopting external ideas through its partnerships with startups and its technology licensing program. These partnerships help Caterpillar to bridge the gap between internal and external innovators by creating new solutions or enhancing existing products as part of an incremental innovation process.

Technology Licensing: It is a one safe source at Caterpillar to evaluate ideas; it gets one connected with the appropriate group within its global enterprise and develops the appropriate agreement.

Automation & enterprise solutions: The goal is to improve operator productivity for all experience levels, lower operating costs, optimize service intervals and leverage technology and big data analytics to provide customer site and business solutions.

Energy & transportation: The goal is to increase power density, efficiency, alternative fuels use, life and extended service interval while significantly decreasing owning and operating costs.

Factory technology solutions: The goal is to improve productivity, first time through quality, process capability and overall cost to serve.

Machine & machine systems: The goal is to provide machines and machine systems with improved efficiency, greater uptime, modularity at significant lower owning and operating costs.

Engineering a giant: THE CAT D10 DOZER

In 1977 the first thing everyone noticed about the Cat D10 was it was different. It didn’t just look unusual; it was big. Fully equipped with ROPS cab, multi-shank ripper, straight dozer blade, full fuel tank, coolants, lubricant, and operator it weighed almost 180,000 pounds. It was over 31 feet long and measured 15 feet from ground to top of the exhaust stack. The Cat D10 was 12 feet wide and had a standard track gauge of 114 inches for dozing and ripping applications.

In early 1970s there was a growing need for a tractor to do massive ripping, push-loading, and dozing work that was beyond the capabilities of what was Caterpillar’s largest tractor: the Cat D9.

After carefully considering the economics of such a tractor, Caterpillar established design goals for a Cat D10 and began work on research and development. Satisfying Caterpillar’s goals required utilizing both technologies from years of prior research and development, as well as a lengthy and extensive research and development program specifically for this size of machine.

After deciding to develop the Cat D10, one of the first things the engineers determined was that they could not satisfy all of their goals by simply building a scaled-up version of existing tractors. This would have introduced many new problems with performance and reliability. Some truly new technological innovations would be required.

One of the most significant of these innovations was a brand-new and totally resilient undercarriage with an elevated sprocket. The design not only got the sprocket up and away from shock loads, mud, and rock, but it also provided for the only track-type tractor final-drive system with a common center-line between the steering clutches and brakes, similar to the arrangement found on existing Cat wheel loaders.

Today Caterpillar takes its physical design for granted, as it looks like many of today’s Cat track-type tractor models. The new undercarriage that made the machine look so unusual ended up such a success it was eventually deployed on many of its other tractor models. The resilient undercarriage and elevated sprocket, in fact, contributed significantly to the accomplishment of the D10’s overall design goals including:

• High productivity
• Modular design
• Simplified maintenance
• Operator efficiency
• Transportability

After a series of pilot tests, Caterpillar’s engineers were encouraged by the comments from foremen and operators alike. Job superintendents and foremen were impressed with the performance, and the operators felt the machine was easier to operate, more comfortable, and less fatiguing. The impressive results and enthusiastic user responses convinced the engineers they had met the project’s design goals.

Today, the Cat D10 remains a physically and economically attractive dozer, doing demanding jobs all over the world.

The real hero: Caterpillar Inc.

Caterpillar Inc. works in all the fields of science and engineering to provide products and services for the customers. The company is not only focuses on manufacturing, but also looks forward to help every issue in the society. From the past 92 years, the company has written every line of its tale with a dream of doing well to the world. Caterpillar Inc. is the real hero in the theatre who aims to make the world a place.

Meet the CEO

Jim Umpleby is the chief executive officer (CEO) and a member of the board of directors of Caterpillar Inc. Umpleby joined Solar Turbines Incorporated in San Diego, California as an associate engineer in 1980. Solar Turbines is a wholly owned Caterpillar subsidiary and a leading manufacturer of industrial gas turbine systems.

Umpleby has held leadership positions in a variety of functions including engineering, manufacturing, marketing, sales and services. He was promoted to a vice-president of Solar Turbines in 1997 and led the Customer Services business. As a Solar Turbines vice-president he later led Solar’s Oil & Gas, Power Generation and Turbo-machinery Products divisions. As general manager of global services for Caterpillar’s Product Support division, he launched Caterpillar’s Job Site Solutions business, which works with Caterpillar dealers to help machine customers maximize job site productivity.

"Integrity, Excellence, Teamwork, Commitment, and Sustainability, despite our differences in geography, culture, language and business - we are one Caterpillar, one company united by these common principles with a shared commitment to the highest standards of conduct."