Mehrdad Haidarpour, CEO of Mabna Card Aria Cammercial Company, talks about the company's achievements in providing banking equipment and office machines, supplying and equipping banking hardware and software, and providing after-sales service for this equipment. He introduces the strengthening of the support unit as an important factor in improving the position of his business and provides a description of the new achievements of this group in the field of imports. One of these achievements is the introduction of a currency authentication device that detects counterfeit or genuine 67 types of currency. You can read the full text of the interview with Mehrdad Haidarpour below.
If you want to briefly describe the path that Mabna Card Aria Commercial Company has taken to date, what would you say?
As you know, Mabna Card Aria Company was established in 2007. Initially, we discussed PSP in addition to banking and payment hardware issues. These activities continued together until in 2014, 60% of the shares of Mabna Card Aria Company were transferred to Saderat Bank and we transferred the set of activities related to banking equipment to a company called Mabna Card Aria Commercial. With this change, the Mabna Card Commercial Company became equipment-driven, and since then its main revenue has been around hardware. During these years, despite the problems arising from the sanctions, especially since 2017, when the bottlenecks became more difficult, we were able to develop our product distribution network, which includes sorters, self-receivers, instant card printers, and so on. Today, there are nearly 10,000 of our card printers in the banking network, and many customers who have been buying from our competitors over the years have been happy to return to repurchase their card-based equipment. We have nearly three thousand GRG sorters in the country. In this regard, despite the fact that about 10 years have passed since the presence of our competitors in the market, since we were able to localize and introduce GRG products well, we were met with great success and we were able to sell different types of this device to the country market to meet their needs. Regarding obstacles in last year،and we are dealing with in current year as well.
What path has Mabna Card Aria Commercial Company passed for support system?
In the field of support, considering the maturity of the company in providing equipment, we decided to provide support in a more specialized and professional way. Despite all the difficult conditions in terms of foreign exchange and parts supply in the country, but we managed to maintain the same three-hour SLA to deal with the failure of our devices throughout the country; It means, we support the service from the point where the failure is reported to the call center and to the point where the service ends in less than 3 hours. Due to the extensive network of agencies, more than 80% of which are our direct agencies, we were able to provide this level of service to customers. The units we have created to conserve this level of service include quality control units, training unit, call center unit, dealership affairs unit, technicians and repairs and parts warehouse unit. Also, our customer affairs unit provides services independently in Ravanpour building. Our after-sales service is what has boosted our sales over the years. Maybe some competitors are unaware of this and know the starting and ending point in sales. But I believe that if you provide quality after-sales service to customers in a situation where the product itself has a capital value and the possibility of clearance or budgets are not such that they can quickly change the device, the issue of after-sales service becomes important and customers try They do as much as possible to connect the devices with reliable support services to keep them running and working. We started after-sales service in 2012 and tried to bring it to a desirable point so that we can keep customers satisfied. Of course, other units of the company also developed during this period, including our development efforts to create a contract refinement unit in which we created support contracts. Although your company is a hardware-driven body, you have also entered the field of software. Please explain about this. Due to the conditions of sanctions and equipment changes, the company has also moved to the field of software, and we have been able to take steps in the production of applications that will be introduced to the market in the near future. In fact, we felt that the card-based trading company needed to focus more on this issue, given its brand and reputation, and its good investment. The team is currently forming and growing, and we hope to see the results next year. Some of these applications will focus on B2C domains and some on B2B domains. Given that the nature of the card-based trading company is based on imports.
How do you manage the challenge of securing foreign exchange during imports?
I believe that companies can remain in this field with enough experience in this field. We at Mabna Card Commercial Company have a good experience in the field of business and with the office we had in Turkey and the connections we have, we tried to be able to make purchases. For example, fewer companies in the country are now able to import Japanese goods, while we continue to import high quality Japanese Glory products into the country. However, unfortunately, some of our goods have remained in the Iranian customs for 4 months due to currency allocation problems. However, we try to import goods from different sources. On the other hand, we see that in the name of supporting domestic production, the import of many goods has been stopped. If you look at many of these seemingly domestically produced products, you will notice that there is no production and only a few batches of assembly are taking place, and it is interesting that the same assembly can not meet the needs of the country. Given that the price of currency has a great impact on the pricing of your products and activities
Do you have a forecast for the price of currency by the end of 2020?
In my opinion, the price of currency in Iran is more dependent on political issues than economic issues, so the answer to this question depends entirely on the political situation of the country, which I do not have a specialized servant in this field. However, in my opinion, based on my experience over the years, the exchange rate in the country will jump again by the end of the year, unless unforeseen events occur in the political arena. In the last interview we had, you were supposed to take action in production as well.
Where did that issue of the production unit go?
We are a commercial engineering company and we are mainly engaged in importing. However, we also considered the issue of domestic production, but because the country's policies in this area are not very transparent and predictable, the risk of doing so is very high. For example, we are ready to set up a production unit with international standards. But if there is a sudden opening in the political sphere and the import conditions and the presence of prominent foreign brands are facilitated, in practice, imported goods will reduce the attractiveness of domestic products. As a result, this issue has been kept silent by the Mabna Card Commercial Company for the time being. Until the end of 1997, Mabna Card Aria Commercial Company was the representative of 7 brands as follows; "IDP company from South Korea with various types of PVC card printers under the name of Smart", "GRG company from China in the field of banknote sorters" and "Glory company from Japan in the field of check scanners", "Zebra hospital wristband company", "Company Seaory from China in the field of PVC cards and offset printing on them "," Dors company from Russia in the field of banknote banknote "and recognition of banknote authenticity and" MIP company from South Korea in the field of footnote ".
What products did you add to your product portfolio after that?
We have added perforation Olivetti machines or delivery printers to our products, which we have imported in high circulation. Another new product in our product portfolio is the ribbon shredder; Many of our customers were concerned about the card information remaining on the ribbons and wanted a tool to delete them. We reached a joint project with IDP to produce this device, and this device was produced and distributed in the country's banking network earlier this year. We have provided this device to Mellat, Keshavarzi and Sepah banks so far; It is a small, portable device that completely shreds the ribbons so that no more information can be seen on them. This device is unique in the world and has no analogues. Our other new product is a currency authentication device, which is a mobile device the size of a mobile phone that detects counterfeit or genuine 67 currencies. In addition to bank branches, this device can also be used in centers such as exchange offices and.. In addition, we have other new products in our product list, which unfortunately, due to the conditions of sanctions, their imports are facing problems and obstacles that we are trying to overcome. This is a problem that not us, but all companies face. Of course, domestic laws have also made imports more difficult; For example, it is said that anyone who wants to import a product must provide a sales history of that product; That is, the currency is allocated to the import of goods in which the company has expertise and background, which has caused problems for importing companies. For example, for new devices that have no sales history at all.
What sales history should be provided? Given the hot topic of the corona and the issue of disinfection, is there currently a tool or device for disinfecting banknotes?
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