More than 120 leaders from KONE Inc., a leading elevator and escalator manufacturing company with its Americas headquarters near Chicago, Ill., worked to help restore a local school as part of the company’s annual Americas Leadership Meeting in Cancun.
KONE reviewed a number of possible community projects for this year’s leadership meeting and chose the “Back to School Dream” building event. A local school, Kinder Revolución, located at Av. Gonzalo Guerrero in Cancun, Mexico, will have the school grounds and classroom buildings restored in an effort to improve the students’ educational opportunities. About 400 students, mostly from families who have been financially impacted by the downturn in the hospitality industry attend the school.
“For all of us at KONE, this is a great opportunity to extend our community engagement efforts into another part of our Americas region while providing many children a better environment at the place they go to learn every day,” said Vance Tang, KONE EVP and Area Director for the Americas. “This experience reinforces to our employees the company’s emphasis on contributing to one’s community while providing them with a team-building opportunity, reinforcing safe work practices and making a positive footprint on the environment.”
KONE employees formed teams of 10-20 people each and were given a set of improvement objectives to accomplish, which included painting, gardening, varnishing, installing new doors and organizing school supplies.
KONE’s previous America’s Leadership Meetings were held in San Diego and Chicago, where community activities included building and donating special bicycles to disadvantaged kids and educating students on elevator and escalator safety.
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About KONE
KONE, one of the global leaders in the elevator and escalator industry, was founded in 1910 and celebrates its centennial anniversary in 2010. The company’s objective is to offer the best people flow experience by developing and delivering solutions that enable people to move smoothly, safely, comfortably and without waiting in buildings in an increasingly urbanizing environment. Providing industry-leading elevators, escalators and innovative solutions for modernization and maintenance, KONE has been committed to understanding the needs of its customers in various segments for the past century. In 2009, KONE had annual net sales of EUR 4.7 billion and approximately 34,000 employees. KONE class B shares are listed on the NASDAQ OMX Helsinki Ltd in Finland.
www.kone.com
For further information, please contact:
Ivan Vargas or Mariana Maldonado, Burson-Marsteller
5351-6530/5351-6514
ivan.vargas@bm.com or mariana.maldonado@bm.com
Kellie Lindquist, KONE Inc.
kellie.lindquist@kone.com
1 309-314-7883