KONE Lifts

What to know about KONE lifts

KONE was founded in Finland on 27 October 1910, and the company describes itself equally as an engineering and a service business. This shows in the equipment: components are arranged so that a technician has proper access to them and a building can be serviced for decades rather than handed over and forgotten. KONE is one of the world's Big Four manufacturers, so spare parts and documentation are predictable.

At the heart of most models is EcoDisc: a flat gearless permanent-magnet traction machine shaped like a disc. It fits into the shaft between the guide rails and the overhead slab, so a machine room is either not needed at all - KONE brought the MonoSpace concept to market back in the mid-1990s - or becomes several times smaller. High-speed models keep a small machine room, which takes up about 40% of the area a conventional traction lift requires.

Escalators and moving walks are a separate strength. In shopping centres and transport hubs they run almost non-stop from morning to night, and the difference between brands is measured not by balustrade design but by the service life of the step chain and whether the supplier will still have that chain after three years of operation.

We were frank about price even on our old website: in our conditions KONE works out expensive, so for ordinary housing we more often offer other European brands, above all IZAMET. That is still the case. KONE pays for itself where energy consumption is calculated over years of operation, and where group control or a high-rise layout with heavy passenger traffic is needed.