Geonor markets and sells its products worldwide and have exported equipment to over 100 countries. The company is the only geotechnical company in the Nordic countries that can show more than 60 years of continuous operations. The company is located in Grini Næringspark in Bærum on the outskirts of Oslo.
Geonor was established in 1957 by NGI (Norwegian Geotechnical Institute) and the Norwegian Insitute of Science and Research (NTNF). The basic idea was that Geonor would be responsible for the production and sale of equipment for geotechnical field and laboratory investigations developed at NGI, which had been established four years earlier. Both NGI and Geonor were established as part of NTNFs longstanding efforts to address the practical and technical problems in rebuilding Norway after World War II.
NGI's first director, Danish-born Laurits Bjerrum (1918-1973), was both the driving force behind the creation of Geonor and its first chairman. Bjerrum was a charismatic personality who held a unique position in the Norwegian and international geotechnical research community.
He had a great impact on both the NGI, Geonor and geotechnical research. Since the beginning, Geonor hasfocused on Bjerrum`s ideas of production and sale of reliable and advanced equipment with high quality.
Quality and innovation were key values that were implemented by Geonor's first managing director Arild Andresen (1926-2010). Arild Andresen was the manager of Geonor from 1957 to 1984.
NGI was part owner of Geonor from 1957 to 1997. Norwegian Hydro came in as a partner in 1960 and was the principal shareholder from 1989 to 1997. Øyvind Klevar became managing director in 1993 has been the owner of the company until 2021. As from November 2021 Lagercrantz Group (publ) is new owner, see World-leading, value-creating technology | Lagercrantz.
Geonor has been a pioneer in the development of geotechnical field equipment (vane testers and borers, soil sampling), geotechnical drilling rigs, geotechnical laboratory equipment, and in particular geotechnical and meteorological instrumentation based on the vibrating-wire technology. Key partners in this development have been NGI, the Public Roads Administration and the Norwegian Meteorological Institute.
