This summer, Hitachi Construction Machinery Americas told us to expect more. The company (soon to rebrand as Landcros) invited us down to Georgia for its dealer meeting, and executives teased plans to enter the compact track loader and articulated dump truck markets — via OEM partnerships.

“We don’t have to [make] everything,” Simon Wilson, chief operating officer of Hitachi Construction Machinery Americas, told us at the event. “We have lots of new products that will come, and we also have lots of new partners too that we’ll be engaging with. That’s the open part of our name.”

The new brand name Landcros is an acronym of sorts.

“For us, it’s land,” continued Wilson. “That’s very important. It’s what we take care of for the future. But then the C-R-O-S really is an acronym for us. It’s customer. It’s reliable. It’s open, and it’s solutions.”

Open, in particular, describes the company’s willingness to work with other manufacturers and technology companies. A few months after our Georgia trip, we’re starting to see that strategy expand. Hitachi Construction Machinery Americas just confirmed two new big OEM relationships. Yanmar will manufacture compact track loaders for Landcros, and Bell Equipment will supply Landcros-branded articulated dump trucks. Both agreements expand Hitachi’s North American portfolio into high-volume equipment categories (CTLs especially).

Yanmar will build Landcros compact track loaders

Let’s start small. Hitachi Construction Machinery and Yanmar Holdings signed a letter of intent in July to explore cooperation in compact equipment. At the time, the details remained murky, but in October the companies shared a few more details. Yanmar Compact Equipment North America will manufacture the machines at its Grand Rapids, Minnesota, facility. Remember Yanmar acquired the famed ASV CTL brand in 2019, but announced this year it will be phasing out the ASV name. Hitachi plans to begin selling the CTLs under the Landcros brand in 2027.

Here’s an interesting comment from Masafumi Senzaki, president and executive officer at Hitachi Construction Machinery. This is from the press release:

“North America’s CTL market exceeds 100,000 units in annual demand, making it the largest segment of the compact equipment market. It is especially meaningful to us to offer customers CTLs — a segment with strong growth prospects — under Landcros, our new corporate brand, beginning in April 2027. Under the open strategy set out in our medium-term management plan, Landcros 2028, we believe that co-creating new businesses and value with our partners and growing together is central to Landcros. By building on the strengths of both companies’ brands and sales channels, we will continue to deliver greater value to customers and dealers and drive further growth in our compact equipment business.”

Yanmar has plenty of CTLs for Landcros to choose from. Its newer ASV-heritage Posi-Track lineup stretches from the tiny TL25RP, with an 800-pound rated operating capacity and 23.2 horsepower, to the 103.5-horsepower TL100VP Forestry, with a 4,100-pound ROC. In between are small-, mid-, and large-frame machines. Yanmar also continues to offer CTLs with its more conventional steel-embedded rubber track undercarriage, giving the manufacturer two distinct track-system families across its lineup. What to choose?

The Yanmar deal works both ways

This isn’t simply Yanmar building CTLs for Landcros. The companies are also preparing a reciprocal OEM arrangement. Under that plan, Hitachi would supply compact excavators for Yanmar’s North American dealer network. Think Hitachi’s Dash-7 mini excavator lineup. That makes the partnership a whole lot more interesting.

According to the press release: “Together, these initiatives reflect the companies’ intention to leverage their complementary product portfolios, manufacturing expertise, and established distribution networks to create additional opportunities for customers and dealers.”

Bell brings in articulated dump trucks

One day after announcing the Yanmar deal, Hitachi revealed its other mystery partner. Bell Equipment will supply articulated dump trucks for the Landcros lineup. The initial machines will include:

• ZD30: 30-ton class
• ZD45: 45-ton class
• ZD50: 50-ton class

Those three trucks are scheduled to launch in early summer 2027. Hitachi says additional models will follow, eventually expanding the range from 20 to 60 tons. That gives Landcros an interesting mixture of earthmoving categories — excavators, wheel loaders, compact track loaders, and now articulated dump trucks. Hitachi estimates annual North American ADT demand at 5,000 to 6,000 machines, and it notes this lineup puts it into classes representing roughly 90 percent of that market. This partnership in particular has some older roots. From the press release:

“Bell Equipment has a long history working with Hitachi Construction Machinery, and we have the highest respect for the company, its people, culture, and products. We also know that these industry-leading ADTs, and the Hitachi range of loading tools pair extremely well. As an ADT specialist our product development focuses highly on the end user experience and this collaboration will allow for more dealers and contractors, in the highly competitive North American market, to benefit from the innovation, features, and performance that we have worked hard to bring to market,” said Izak van Niekerk, CEO of Bell Equipment.

Fun fact: Bell, the South African manufacturer, is also working with CNH and Case Construction Equipment on motor graders. Case announced the arrangement at Conexpo 2026. Bell manufactures the new GR925, GR930, and GR935 motor graders, while Case has exclusive distribution rights for those machines in the United States and Canada. The agreement pushes Case back into the 200-plus-horsepower grader classes.

Partnerships are now a part of the Landcros strategy

The Bell and Yanmar deals are big, but they’re not the only Hitachi/Landcros partnerships. The company is working with Pronto on open mine automation, Teleo on supervised autonomy, and Gravis Robotics on machine guidance and autonomous excavator operation. At the dealer meeting, Wilson also discussed possible opportunities in demolition, material handling, or with other products Hitachi already offers elsewhere around the world. And that brings us back to the bigger strategy.

“There are other segments that we’re talking about and looking [at] because we really believe we can expand the portfolio,” Wilson told us. “[Our] dealer body is a very strong dealer group.... They can handle it. They’re asking for it.”