Binh Duong currently has hundreds of enterprise operating in the field of manufacturing and exporting wood. These companies are increasing investments in technologically advanced production lines to compete on the international market.
A production line worth millions dollar of Lam Viet Corporation (Tan Uyen Town)
Finding a safe direction
According to leaders of Binh Duong Furniture Association (BIFA), economic integration helps reduce wood industry’s risks in order to no longer depend on a certain market. However, enterprises are not allowed to be subjective, because today the economic integration is taking place on a global scale. Any economic decline of a country, a region still could cause a domino effect like the US financial crisis in 2008, and then spread around the world.
Leaders of a timber enterprise in the province said, currently in Binh Duong province, some timber companies are actively involved in buying and selling shares with enterprises of timber and other industries. The trend of production diversification is going on silently in the business community in Binh Duong. This trend has helped enterprises to mobilize substantial financial resources and gather both gray matter and experiences to strengthen enterprise’s confidence in the economic integration.
Mr. Nguyen Liem, Board of Directors’ Chairman of Lam Viet Corporation (Tan Uyen), said that since the global economic crisis, many companies learned the lesson "never put all eggs in one basket". Therefore, many companies have boldly implemented equitization, and purchased shares of companies operating outside the timber industry.
Significant advantages to businesses with modern technologies
In recent years, wood production and export in Binh Duong have achieved high growth rates. Many timber companies have expanded production scale to receive large orders. Currently, the majority of the domestic timber companies are bearing less pressure on design, because most companies make products with designs according to partner’s orders. Mr. Nguyen Thanh Huy, Director of Thanh Kien Company (Tan Uyen) said, wood products of provincial businesses had been exported mainly to European and America, most product designs were provided by their partners. In the future, wood enterprises should actively learn more about culture, tastes of these large markets to actively create new models to serve consumers. Characteristic of the US and European market is constantly changing design, a new model may be only favored by European customers within a few months. If provincial timber enterprises could have good designs meeting market demands, their product value would be heightened.
According to Mr. Liem, the biggest pressure of the whole country is production technology. Timber production level of Southeast Asian countries is similar; advantages are relied on technology, production lines, machines and equipment.
Currently, the pressure of technological innovation is increasing to enterprises, because of its outstanding features, like saving time and labors, accurate, consistent and aesthetic products meeting customer’ requirements. Production lines help enterprises save many costs, significantly reduce loss and error rate compared to labor power. However, some businesses do not have a sufficient fund to procure modern machinery. Mr. Liem added, for example, a 5-axis CNC machine (imported from Italy) is able to accurately complete tasks of dozens of worker, but worth about VND5 billion as arriving in Vietnam. This is a large amount compared to SMEs.
It can be said, if an enterprise owns modern machinery, they will easily obtain more orders and dominate the wood market in the future.
Reported by Xuan Vi – Translated by Ngoc Huynh
