TOMECO An Khang: Increasing more than 100% of export value by applying PMS model

After approaching and implementing the “Project of applying the overall model of productivity and quality improvement” of the Ministry of Industry and Trade, the export value of TOMECO An Khang Electrical Mechanical Joint Stock Company has increased more than 100% in 2019. compared to the original 30% target.

TOMECO An Khang Joint Stock Company, which was established in 1993, has transformed many types of operating models and by 2018, officially operated as a parent-child model. In 2019, the Company’s Industrial Fan products were added to the city’s main product list by the Hanoi Department of Industry and Trade.

In its business motto, TOMECO is constantly investing in modern technology equipment, timely application of advanced scientific and technical advances of the world, effective and thoughtful cooperation with customers and comprehensive cooperation with well-known material and component suppliers, aiming at the sustainable development of the business.

Since 2012, the Company has focused on developing the supporting industry and has officially become a supplier in the global supply chain for world famous brands such as General Electric Group – GE (USA). In 2014, he became a supplier of burners and oil and gas products to Green Combustion Company (UK). From this product, Green Combustion is exported to countries all over the world such as USA, Middle East, Scotlen, Malaysia, including Vietnam for Nghi Son oil and gas.

Especially, since 2015, TOMECO has cooperated with advanced fan manufacturer from Spain – SODECA S.L.U. to research and apply new technologies in the world to the design and cooperation in manufacturing smoke exhaust fans, spread fire protection & fire safety for the Vietnamese market. This is also an area of ​​activity being evaluated as a potential of the Company.

The harder it is to choose the difference

Sharing with us, Mr. Le Quy Kha – Chairman of the Board of Directors, General Director of TOMECO An Khang Electrical Mechanical Joint Stock Company said that the small businesses face more and more difficulties, because the desire is extremely, but the capacity is term. We really want to be a professional factory, but the surrounding ecosystem basically doesn’t work. I just take a simple example, foreign customers come to order us 6 months, 1 year, the weekly delivery schedule is very clear. But Vietnam is different, asking for quotes from last year, this year to order, but to order is to claim immediately. Dozens of guests like that our production turned upside down. At the peak, the goods were lined up in the warehouse, there was no aisle at the beach, no one could think of 5S anymore because everything was too urgent, must give all efforts to production. Out of peak, then white yards, nothing left to clean. This is a common situation for small businesses and also very difficult to solve. Manufacturing at times stretch, at bulging, when there are many orders are tangled again.

Another difficulty is competition from within Vietnam and abroad. Competitors come rushing, not even finishing production. I want TOMECO to develop sustainably, to produce high-performance, energy-saving and environment-friendly products, but customers do not really care about that. My goods cannot be sold directly to consumers but must be sold through contractors, project owners, direct users without quality control. Customers are only interested in cheap prices, while my products can not be cheap if they meet the above standards, so it is difficult to compete with manufacturers that only care about prices. This is also a problem that makes us very headache, Mr. Kha said.

However, to limit the impact of the objective difficulties, TOMECO chooses a different path for itself.

With the strength of industrial fan production for 26 years, holding and controlling the entire value chain in fan production from research, design, production, installation and warranty, etc helps TOMECO to custom “tailoring” products according to the unique needs of each project.

For supporting products, the Company determined not to support mass production, but to make small orders for the company with very high quality management and technology requirements. Mr. Kha said, there are orders with up to 5 parties participating in the acceptance test: the investor, the consultant of the investor, the customer, the customer consultant, including his own consultant, 5 experts from 5 different countries to sit and test their products. Since then, the Company has started to shape its global manufacturing strategy, connecting with experts from leading industrial countries in the world. With these orders, the output value is not high, but the product meets international standards. Thereby, both the managerial level, as well as the skills of the workers have improved, gradually building the Company’s brand in the chain of supporting industrial enterprises of well-known corporations in the world.

If there is determination still do well

Producers have to think about productivity and TOMECO is no exception. To become a supporting industry satellite in the future, for many years, the Company has implemented many quality management systems according to ISO 9001: 2015, ISO 5801: 2007, LEAN and 5S tools; participate in many projects of JICA, WB, etc in order to improve the management system and improve labor productivity, increase competitiveness of enterprises. However, according to the enterprise’s assessment, the measures are not really effective, always in the state of having advice there is good, where advice is complete.

Although in 2018, the Company invested quite strongly to innovate technology, purchase modern equipment, but the Company only produced 60-70% of the design capacity. The rate of on-time delivery is 60%. Many causes of slow delivery cannot be solved. Even, the Company’s leader asserted that the company was not afraid to invest but had to hold back because people could not adapt, management did not catch up with technology.

Therefore, when approaching the Ministry of Industry and Trade project and through the consultants of the Vietnam Productivity Institute, the Company decided to participate and determined to pursue the project’s goals strictly. In response to the desire to fundamentally change the perceptions of improving productivity from the contingent of leaders to employees of all departments and workshops.

After investigating the situation and the causes leading to the fact that the productivity of the Company did not improve after investing in many new equipment, the consulting team and the Company’s leaders agreed a number of solutions Methods of improvement focus on improving customer satisfaction on product quality and customer service; Improve delivery schedule; Improve equipment performance; Improve workshop performance; Quality improvement; Building an improved culture.

Mr. Le Quy Kha highly appreciated the role of the Vietnam Productivity Institute consultants in promoting the change of the whole staff. On the side of the Vietnam National Institute of Productivity, it was thought that, with the great support of the company’s leaders, plus the thinking ability of the project team appointed by the Company, the new consultants could resolve the original. The root of the matter is such.

After giving specific solutions to each goal, the consulting team worked closely with the whole company to try to implement improvement proposals within 12 months and the Company’s leaders realized the change is very clear. The initial comment of the Company is that labor costs/revenue have shown signs of declining, while brother’s income is still good, factory premises are more neat, reducing unnecessary stress in production.

The specific results in the table below show how encouraging the change is.

Through the project implementation, managers and employees of the Company have gained experience in implementing improvement projects and are proactive in subsequent improvement activities.

By setting up a performance measurement system with specific numbers to let managers know the current status of production at any time helps to make timely decisions, reduce meeting time because full of necessary data, and workers know the effectiveness of their work to try to strive.

From this result, the Company has planned to continue to improve in the following years, focusing on perfecting the corporate governance system.

Source: VNPI