According to ING's Economics Department, the high-tech industry in the Northern Netherlands is one of the growth sectors. The bank even calls our cluster "one of the gems" of industry in the North. According to chairman Kor Visscher, the growth of our cluster is a logical consequence of the speed at which technical developments are taking place. “Many companies develop all kinds of new products and services with the latest technology. The speed at which this is happening regularly presents us with challenges with unknown solutions. By bringing together knowledge from different industries, we as a group develop faster than our competitors. In this way we give direction to the smart industry in the Northern Netherlands.”

Turbine blades

Stork Turbo Blade has 55 years of experience in making complex turbine blades for, among other things, steam and gas turbines of power plants. Reinsma: ,,Our company has a modern machine park with 4 and 5 axis CNC milling machines and fully automated production cells. In addition, our engineers have many years of experience with Siemens NX CAD/CAM software and we use 3D scanners for reverse engineering of existing products. We would like to share this knowledge and experience with the partners of the cluster''. Stork is also continuously working on improving the performance of its customers' assets through multidisciplinary maintenance, turnarounds and projects.

Share knowledge

Stork has a worldwide employee program that focuses on health, safety, security, environment and quality, Reach Beyond Zero. ,,With this we activate and motivate our employees to challenge themselves, with a view to improving our safety culture and our performance'', explains Reinsma. Stork goes further than just reducing incidents. “With our program we stimulate individual initiatives for positive and sustainable change at Stork. For example, sharing information and knowledge and by exchanging lessons learned, best practices and warnings."