In a tiny town called Elva, there dwells a colossal company – on Estonian scale – called Enics Eesti. Last year, it came close to €88m of turnover. By 2012 results, Enics ranked 87th on Postimees-compiled Estonian Top 100.
Big business, almost unknown
3rd July 2014, 18:54
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For many in the know of Estonian business, the enterprise comes as a surprise. This, its CEO Jaanus Aal aims to alter. He’s about to more actively advertise the company, inviting politicians, and other enterprises via Estonian Electronics Industries Association.
Raising awareness is not to boost sales, as 94 percent of it goes abroad – in homeland, Enics has just one client. Rather, the reason is labour force.
«To gain attention, we’ll be trying to invite other businesses over as much as possible. If we aren’t known, it is hard to catch the good players, on the labour market,» said Mr Aal.
No small clients
Enics’ plants are on, 24/7. Last year, the enterprise employed about 740, hauled in by buses – from Valga, Rõngu/Puhja, and Tartu.
No big deal to find the unskilled staff; with specialists – there’s great dearth.
«We are just about to decide whether to develop a product or not. A decisive nuance is what kinds of people we will find,» said Mr Aal.
Enics is into production of industrial electronics, for greatly varying fields.
«Like: to switch in the coffee machine, power needs to be brought from Narva. As helped by electronics,» says Mr Aal. «Our electronic systems guide elevators up and down; our systems direct trains so they end up the right places.»
Enics works for international giants like ABB and Bombardier etc. The clients are few – count on two hands.
«Strategically, we have no clients under five percent of sales revenue, and none over 25 percent,» said Mr Aal. «Getting a new customer, he needs to cross the 5 percent level in two years. We’d rather not have smaller ones than that.»
All in all, the Elva plant makes about 1,200 products, the smallest being safety controls – tens and hundreds of thousands of these. The larger items may be cabinets of a couple of metres high, to be placed in trains etc. «The market is geared towards larger special solutions,» explains Mr Aal.
Enics Eesti’s parent company is registered in Switzerland. Established in 2004, its management purchased part of Elcoteq – which used to do business here as well. The management owns a dozen or so percent of Enics, the rest belongs to a private equity firm.
Travelling hard
The group has eight plants in the world, total turnover being €417m last year. Of that, Estonia gives a fifth. Considering that the group is sixth in size, in the field globally, the Estonian subsidiary is quite a heavyweight.
The group’s headquarters located in heart of Europe – Zurich – and Estonian plant in our own farthest corner in Elva, travelling does pose a problem, both to headquarters and to clients.
«Last year, we travelled for about €120,000 – 130,000. This year, it’ll be more,» admitted Mr Aal and said it was indeed a headache.
«As pointed out by a client: coming to Elva, from Central Europe, takes as much time as going to Shanghai, China,» he added.