Water & Wastewater Asia May/June 2019

INSIGHT | 39
With the opening of the French group’s new subsidiary in Singapore, customers
may expect faster, more efficient service.
LACROIX Sofrel is a familiar name in the
European market, known as the French
market leader in telemetry and SCADA.
Reaching out across the globe, the opening of
its new Singaporean subsidiary is seen as a bid
to strengthen its position in the ASEAN region.
WHY SINGAPORE?
According to business development manager
Eric Woo, the move to Singapore was a
strategic one, meant to improve relations with
customers in the region.
“With this, we are close to the customer. We
understand their needs; we can react to the
market to capture business opportunities.
When you react fast, you have the advantage.
We close the time difference gap between
here and Europe. That’s why we set up this
subsidiary – to be close to the customer, and
provide almost-immediate responses to our
partners and customers.”
Besides allowing for faster reaction times
to customers’ queries, Woo shared that
the subsidiary’s location also allows him to
monitor trends in the ASEAN market, talk to
regional customers to find out what they need
in a product to solve their problems – and then
share all this information with headquarters
back in France.
“This is the reason why I’m here, to listen to
what the market needs, study it, and then
feedback if we should develop or drop it. All
these things need a central hub to collect
all this information. We would never be able
to get the information if we were sitting in
France; it has to be someone here close to
the market, understanding the customer.”
ASIAN VS EUROPEAN MARKETS
When it comes to the Asian market, needs
and wants for product features may differ
as compared to European markets, but Woo
explained that it’s not enough to simply finetune
products to meet regional demands.
“Competition is tougher here; we have more
players. For example, in Thailand there
are also local-made products competing
with international brands. Price wise, we
are definitely at a disadvantage, but some
customers look for reliability and quality, and
don’t mind paying a bit more compared to the
locally-made products.”
ASEAN TRENDS
Compared to its European counterparts,
the ASEAN market is a lot more diverse
than many might think, especially when
it comes to levels of understanding for
newer technology. According to Woo,
some companies are still struggling to
evolve, modernise, and keep up with the
competition. LACROIX Sofrel’s answer to
companies lagging behind their competitors?
Training courses, held at the Singapore
subsidiary.
Explained Woo: “We’re basically talking
about solutions, we’re selling solutions.
What the customers want is ‘What can you
provide to benefit me after I have selected
your solution?’. This is something we want to
build up, we want to train all our partners and
customers. In fact, we already have trained
some of our partners from Malaysia – in
the coming months, our partners from the
Philippines will be here too.
LOOKING FORWARD
The new office is just about ready, and so is
Woo, sharing that he expects great successes
from the subsidiary with him at its helm, and
hints at the possibility of tapping into other
markets when the time is right.
“The whole of the ASEAN region is a very
different climate as compared to Europe. I
want to be self-sufficient, to provide first-hand
support to all our partners in the region; and
to support projects in the ASEAN region when
necessary and appropriate, when partners
come into our office.
We expect our business here to grow. Not
rapidly, but at least we will have consistent
growth, looking at how the Asian side of
business is booming. For our kind of business
in water and wastewater, there’s a lot to do
so we know that the potential is here, and we
want to capture that.
Of course, we won’t just target the ASEAN
region – China is one of the countries we’re
looking at to develop our business. Later
on, New Zealand, Australia – gradually, we’ll
expand the business.” WWA
Image credit to LACROIX Sofrel.
Water & Wastewater Asia • May / June 2019