PT Karunia Armada Indonesia (Karunia), a Liebherr Indonesia customer, met with Liebherr officials at Bauma 2022 to commemorate their partnership throughout the development and validation process for the new R 9300 Generation 8 mining excavator.

The R 9300 has been unveiled to the public for the first time at Bauma 2022. However, Karunia has been operating one unit of the R 9300 since September of this year. Throughout the operation of this excavator, Karunia has been providing Liebherr with valuable insight into the overall performance of the R 9300 as well as the functionality of the new, more advanced, Liebherr Mining technologies fitted into the machine. These new technologies provide increased operational efficiency, reduced fuel consumption and GHG (greenhouse gas) emissions, and higher levels of operator safety and comfort.

The R 9300 is currently being used to remove and load overburden on site and to load coal into 100 tonne mining trucks. This new excavator is capable of filling trucks of this size in a total of four passes. “The performance of the R 9300 surpasses our expectations by far. All the newly installed features have definitely supported us in achieving continuous and peak productivity targets!” stated Nahdi Asfahani, Karunia’s Director of Plant and Supply Chain.

Karunia is a mining contractor headquartered in Balikpapan, East Kalimantan. Karunia was established in 1993 and started its operations by offering construction services and the supply and rental of heavy equipment. As part of these core activities, Karunia has carried out several infrastructure projects around the mining concessions of PT Bayan Resources Tbk (Bayan). In 2011, Karunia was given the opportunity to expand its services within the mining business when Bayan offered an initial contract for the Tabang mine.

Liebherr cemented its own relationship with Karunia in late 2021, with the handing over of an R 9100 mining excavator at the Tabang mine site in East Borneo, Indonesia.

Christian Bombenger, the Managing Director of Liebherr Indonesia, said of the partnership, “We appreciate the tremendous level of trust and transparency that has prevailed in our relationship from the get-go. Our companies communicate incredibly well at all levels and we always find innovative solutions to further improve our partnership over time.”

Karunia has expressed its great satisfaction with the performance of other Liebherr products already in operation on site. These products include the R 9100 and R 9200 mining excavators and the PR 776 mining dozers. In fact, as a result of the performance of these machines, Karunia has purchased additional units of these models, bringing the total number of units in its Liebherr fleet to 22.

“We have experienced high levels of professionalism, commitment, excellent communication and effectiveness with Liebherr Indonesia. These values are clearly what we also see as essential for a lasting relationship,” commented Achmad Asfia, President Director & Owner of Karunia. The recent partnership between Liebherr Indonesia and Karunia also represents new opportunities for Liebherr Mining as a whole. “This new partnership allows us to once again demonstrate both the consistency we are known for in the market, but also to deliver superb and promising new perspectives for our future sustainable growth in Indonesia,” said Max Muench, General Manager of Sales & Marketing for Liebherr Indonesia.

The R 9300 mining excavator is still currently within the validation stage but will enter serial production in 2024.