Mustafa UÇAR GENERAL MANAGER of INTEGRA

Hi, Mr. Mustafa. Could you give information about your export activities in 2020?

When we examine our turnover in 2020, we see that our export turnover is increasing. Our export turnover has reached 24% of our total turnover as of the end of the 11th month. As you know, our company operates on the supply side and mostly supplies and sells special components. In this case, our exports are aimed at meeting the demand for special components. We are working on selling value added products to difficult markets instead of determining a regional target. Producer countries have entered into serious competition in terms of raw materials or price performance products based on the advantageous conditions in our country. There are competitors with high power of economies of scale such as China and India against our offers, therefore, as Integra Elevator, we are trying to find the markets that are called difficult with high value added products.

As a company that has been operating in the sector for many years, what have you determined as a sustainable export policy for 2021?
Cooperation and partnership shall be our defining goal here. Let us try to make an analysis by changing our perspective. All of our companies try to be more effective in export markets in response to the domestic market where the demand is decreasing, and each company uses its own dynamics and strengths. We are within European standards, we have been in a breakthrough with fairs, promotions and business visits since the beginning of the 2000s, and we have the ability to adapt quickly to different market needs. We have a successful business plan so far, now let us try to evaluate ourselves from our customer's perspective. Among the possible perspectives, affordable price ranks the first and confidence sensitivity is in its immediate follow-up. I think there are concerns for national stability following that. Our duty is to evaluate ourselves with the eyes of the customer and to come out of this process successfully. As Integra, the meaning of this success on the export side is to ensure that products with high added value are long-lasting under conditions of cooperation.

Which regions or countries is the market density shifting? Which products are in more demand?
It depends on the service provided and elevator structuring of a country. When we look at the Turkic Republics, complete systems are in more demand. Recently, Russia has been demanding both the complete system and the components that shall support its own manufacturing. As we continue through our border neighbors, Iran is in serious silence and it has become difficult to import to Iran since the country is struggling with both embargo and pandemic conditions. It seems that there is a slowdown in Iraqi structuring. When we examine Syria, some old friends we talked with stated that they paid fines for the products made in Turkey in their stocks. Lebanon is going through an economic crisis and they do not pay customs duty for the products purchased from the European Union. We had a Saber problem with Saudi Arabia last spring and some of our manufacturers' orders had to be held before customs clearance. An unofficial embargo atmosphere has been created. Egypt and Tunisia increased tariffs. Our exports are increasing in North Africa and it is clear that our other manufacturers are successful in complete system works. By the way, our sister company is in India. It is observed that we can seize opportunities in markets with rapid urbanization, which has achieved serious increases however I would like to state that a very hard work has been done to get the necessary share from this market. Integra, has an ascending graphic in the Euro zone. As the mutual cooperation increases in these regions, our high value-added businesses also increase. With the development of communication channels, we had some meetings in distant geographies. As a result, our target market is the place where our capabilities are appreciated rather than the region concentration.

When you evaluate your company data for this year compared to the same period of last year, what are your 2021 export forecasts?
Export turnover shall continue to increase, we are trying to create a move to develop cooperation. Instead of focusing on price-performance-based products, we focus on efforts that can make us a solution partner in systems. We are making more efforts to go beyond the natural increase and to increase our export turnover to 50%.

What can you specify as the main developments and events affecting our sector that you consider important in terms of the elevator sector in 2020?
Our sector experiencing a comfortable period in the face of high demand, is firstly affected by the stagnation in the construction sector which was followed by the pandemic. Our business plans, which we have built mostly on bilateral relations and communication, have been revised due to the pandemic. The main development for our industry in 2020 has been to think about what we should do in terms of digitalization and efficiency and to make practice tests.