Mario Scolozzi, Country Manager (China), Redaelli Tecna Spa
The Chinese market in general has great growth potential. Many overseas wire rope companies open branches in China, Redaelli is one of them. Redaelli is a historic leading Italian company in the production of wire ropes and engineering of tenso structures. The company plays a pioneering role in the industry. Redaelli products are manufactured with experience and expertise, and are well known all over the world. Radaelli has been recently awarded by the Guinness World Records for the third time for manufacturing the heaviest wire rope in the world.
LRW visited Redaelli’s office in Shanghai and had a conversation with Mario Scolozzi, Redaelli’s China manager.
LRW: Please give us a brief introduction of Redaelli.
Mario: Redaelli is a company founded almost 200 years ago in Italy. At the moment, we can produce steel wire ropes for all kinds of applications, especially for offshore oil & gas (O&G) industry, mine industry, passenger ropeways, and material transportation cableways. We also produce building crane ropes, harbor crane ropes, marble cutting ropes, among many different kinds of steel wire ropes.
We have enhanced our efforts in emerging markets such as China, Brazil, while we are already extremely strong in the traditional offshore spots (North Sea, Gulf of Mexico). For the industries we supply, the focus is especially on the offshore industry, that is where the most of our revenues come from. For example in Europe, in the triangle of UK, Norway, the Netherlands, and all the other places that the offshore industries are growing fast, we have strong presence in the markets. In the meantime, we are also getting strong in the mining industry and crane industry.
We have production facilities located solely in Italy. We have one plant located near Milan; the other one is in Trieste, where we specialize in the production of offshore wire ropes.
One particular achievement of Redaelli is that we manufactured the world’s heaviest wire ropes, the wire rope that recently broke the world record has a diameter of 155mm and weighs about 500 tons. And this is the third time in four years that Redaelli broke the Guinness World Records for manufacturing the world’s heaviest wire rope.
LRW: What are the advantages of Redaelli’s products?
Mario: The advantages are basically the flexibility we offer.
We listen to our customers and recommend the exact products they need. We can give warranty to the customers that the product is well done. We are quite flexible in terms of payment and technical solutions.
And the fact that we carry out complete production processes of wire ropes inside the company. We buy, from Italian steel mills, the wire rods. We drew the wire, we can obtain whatever kinds or sizes of strands, and whatever kinds of surface finishing. Thus we can produce a complete range of wire ropes.
Our products suit many different applications. Among which, our reference list is huge especially in the offshore O&G field. We have hundreds of records of very big projects. If someone calls Redaelli, especially in the offshore O&G industry, it is like going into one of the most capable producers. We have expertise in this field.
LRW: How does Redaelli operate globally?
Mario: Redaelli operates mainly through our headquarters near Milan, Italy, selling from there to all over the world. In China, we have our main office in Shanghai, in addition to another one in Beijing. Moreover, we have an office in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where the offshore industry is developing quite fast. For the rest of the world, customers’ enquires are generally handled by our headquarters in Italy.
LRW: Tell us more about the services Redaelli offer to customers.
Mario: Redaelli is a company with highly experienced people from the wire rope field. We are one of the most capable and experienced company in the industry, our expertise enables us to offer unmatched services covering different phrases from pre-preproduction to the applications of products in the field.
Our services are of different kinds, one kind is the advice we can give a in the phase prior to a customer order. For example, for a customer who is developing a new crane, they may have some doubts on the lifting system, tolerance, or technical measures. Our technicians in Italy have expertise to give advice on how the drum should be made, how the winding system should be made, or how the projects could be better arranged. In this case, we could offer information in the phase of a R&D of a new crane.
Later, we can assist our customers in quotation phase to provide exactly the item for the case. After this, we offer after-sales service that can be done in case of problems should they arise.
We have technicians in our headquarters in Italy. In China, we also have experienced engineers in charge of the inspection, after-sales and all the technical aspects.
For the rest of the world, technical issues are covered by our headquarters in Italy. Our engineers travel to all over the world from Italy when they are in need or there are some issues.
LRW: How is Redaelli doing in the Chinese market?
Mario: The Chinese market for us is growing steadily. Look back for the last few months, we are getting very good sales results. I believe the Redaelli name starts to get well known in China, so we had more contacts with distributors and got lots of inquiries from customers.
In the beginning, when we first opened office in China, Redaelli is not commonly known here. Once our brand name starts to flow, you can see the market grows very fast. The Chinese market is tough in the first attempt. If you have the patience to push and push, later you get the first reference, and everything is growing exponentially.
LRW: What kinds of problems did you face when you enter the Chinese market?
Mario: In the beginning foreign companies don’t understand China very well: the culture is quite different. It is like in Italy or Europe, the people have one mindset, and people here have another mindset. There are misunderstandings or differences in values. And thus, in the beginning, mistrust might arise when we are dealing with customers, and we had to overcome this problem.
In China, there are lots of players and lots of potential customers, the competition is very tough. And the duration of negotiation for a sale can get very long. At the beginning there may be a sense of mistrust for our customers, as some of them are suspicious about our products. Also, customers may try to obtain prices that are too low. When customers push too much on prices, this may not be a positive thing for the company.
It is sometimes difficult to understand customers’ needs. For example, in Europe, when a customer says they don’t want a particular product, more or less, what they say is true. Here in China, at least for the beginning, it seems hard to understand what’s true and what’s false. After some time, when we understand and get used to the way business is conducted, we know how to better communicate with our customers
Basically, I think it is the problem of different mindset, and the differences in the way business is done. Business is quite aggressive. One problem I can see is that, some Chinese customers do not look to long-term cooperations. They want to take the maximum advantage from one business. They don’t do in a way you could both be happy though. They try to get as much as possible from you. This is a little different from other parts of the world.
But after we understand this, and when we create a our business network, we can manage it.
LRW: What’s your short term or long term plan in the Chinese market?
Mario: For short term, we are already in a very good position. We have prepared well for the coming year, we have good fits now.
As we have peace in mind for next year, we are ready to go on scouting the market , to push in all possible ways, especially on the offshore O&G sector, which is our core business. And also in mining, crane sectors that use medium to big diameter wire ropes. We have apparent advantages for bigger diameter ropes in the market.
For long term, we aims to be successful in ship lift projects. We have recently a big ship lift project in the Sichuan province.
We aim to develop further in the offshore industry, be on time with the growth of the Chinese market. Now most of the customer RFQ are concerning temporary mooring lines. In the coming years, we expect this will shift to permanent mooring lines, and also to offshore crane cables (already exist a market, but we believe it will grow). We have to manage these changes. As in China things are changing almost month by month, you have to move at the same speed.
FLEXPACK, the Guinness World Record Steel Wire Rope
In 2010, 2011 and 2013, Redaelli has been awarded by Guinness World Records for three consecutive years for the heaviest wire rope ever manufactured in the world. FLEXPACK, is Redaelli’s state-of-the-art product.
This wire rope represents the Redaelli ultimate answer to subsea applications where high non rotating characteristics, combined with easy handling and long lifetime, are required. The specific design, based on a modular strand concept, together with the compactation of all strands provides the perfect combination to achieve top performance.
FLEXPACK is typically used, but not limited, also for the most severe conditions. For subsea applications, like lifting and lowering of any type of subsea equipment, abandoning and recovery activities, pipe laying operations, etc.
In addition to being the heaviest cable ever made, FLEXPACK is also the first to have its own “Imagine-ID card”, that is the basis for constant control throughout the rope’s operative life.
This article is published on LRW Magazine vol15, 2014.
