News

This year, Artos Engineering Company will celebrate its 100-year anniversary.  Trends, innovations, leaders, even industries all come and go in the mere space of a decade. But over the course of an entire century, Artos has displayed and exercised the traits necessary to lead to its successful longevity. Actionable innovation. Adaptability to serve the evolving needs of its customers. Visionary leadership and a thorough understanding of customer needs. All are traits allowing Artos to serve global markets and engineer machines that serve rapidly changing industries.

Incorporated in 1911, Artos first developed automatic measuring and cutting machines for textile ribbon and other narrow, flexible materials. In 1918, a promising young engineer named Haaken Olsen joined the company. A good engineer is able to recognize not just sound design and development standards, but also when there is a need for innovation. Olsen noticed an increase of usage of insulated copper wire in the manufacture of automobiles, appliances and radios. He also recognized the labor-intensive hurdles of cutting and stripping insulated copper wire by hand.

Olsen knew there was a better way. He envisioned a machine that would pull insulated copper from a reel, measure pre-determined lengths of wire and cut it off and, at the same time, remove the insulation from both ends of the wire. Olsen’s plans helped lead Artos to the development of an industry first – the CS-1 automatic wire cutting and stripping machine in 1926.

Olsen promised his company he would sell at least a dozen new machines. Through door-to-door sales, he succeeded and a new industry was about to be created. It wouldn’t be long before Artos alone would sell nearly 100,000 wire processing machines.

As will happen to any organization over the course of 100 years, Artos has faced many changes, not the least of which includes two World Wars, the Great Depression, economic recessions and, perhaps most telling as the company heads into its 100^th year, economic globalization.

Through it all, Artos adhered to the spirit of innovation instilled years ago by Haaken Olsen. Artos has consistently produced machines that are technologically advanced, labor-saving, cost-effective and useful for a variety of industries and markets.

The Artos mission, proven a success for over a century, has always been to serve customers – large, small and everything in between – by engineering equipment that solves specific wire processing problems. The company currently offers a wide range of products ranging from benchtop stripping machines to fully automated terminating machines.

Today, Artos is lead by President John Olsen II, Haaken Olsen’s great-grandson and the fourth generation of Olsens to lead Artos. “We’re thrilled to reach this milestone,” says Olsen. “On behalf of all of those engineers and other dedicated team members who have been a part of Artos over the years, I want to say ‘thank you.’ We’re proud to serve our customers and grateful they look to us to help achieve their business goals.”

Olsen pays particular attention to the company’s commitment to customer satisfaction. “From day one, we have strived to offer application specific advancements that are faster, give businesses greater efficiency, reduce waste and lead to smart processes to drive the cost out of manufacturing so our customers are more productive and profitable. Our goal is to have a solution ready for our customers before they realize one is needed.”

Artos has stood for reliability and service for decades. “We have to be adaptive to the needs of our industry and our customers’ needs to be successful,” says Olsen. “That held true 100 years ago and it’s true today. We’re optimistic about the future and are looking to grow both domestically and internationally.”

To begin its second century, Artos is moving ahead with new product introductions that anticipate the needs of tomorrow’s industries. Artos is heading into the next 100 years much in the same way Haaken started the company off so long ago. John Olsen is taking “Artos Across America” for the second consecutive summer to showcase the newest solutions Artos has to offer. They’ll be taking their newest innovations directly to customers to listen to feedback and continue their mission of delivering application-focused products and excellent customer service.

Artos
100 Year Anniversary
Wiring Harness News
February, 2011