“During the past 15 years, we have noticed a shift in demand for fruit processing equipment,” says Alan Stender with Atlas Pacific Engineering Company, Inc. “Historically our Company has maintained a significant market share in equipment for the canned fruit industry, but during the past decade, growth has been coming from the fresh-cut segment. Over the last several years Atlas has been developing machines and getting a foothold in the fresh-cut industry. Being one of many equipment manufacturers, fresh-cut processors don’t know us as well as traditional frozen, dried and canned processors do, and we’re working to change that,” said Stender.Atlas Pacific Engineering manufactures a range of different products for the fresh-cut industry:
- FC15 Fruit Chunker that peels, cores, and chunks or spears 15 pieces of fruit per minute (pineapples, cantaloupes and honeydew melons).
- Apple Slicer System (with optional peeling) that feeds, orients, cores, and slices up to 115 apples per minute.
- Apricot Pitter/Halver that orients, slices, and pits up to 1,000 oval shaped apricots per minute.
- Pear Machine that cores and slices pears (optional peeling), with minimal skin damage. With a few change parts, the same machine can be used to peel mangos, kiwis and apples. This hand-fed machine can peel 66 pieces of fruit per minute.
“What differentiates us from our competitors is the fact that we lease our equipment, excluding the fruit chunker, which is a sold machine,” said Stender. Atlas Pacific provides service and maintenance, which includes 100 percent of the parts. “We have over 75 service technicians throughout the world.” The majority of the company’s sales are generated within the US. The remainder comes from the company’s locations in Europe, Australia, South America and South Africa. The service element is a key differentiator. “Within the fresh-cut industry, you can’t lose valuable shelf life time because of defective equipment,” finished Stender.
For more information:
Alan Stender, Western Regional Sales Manager
Atlas Pacific Engineering Company
Tel: (+1) 209 574 9884