A Deep Dive into the European Power Transmission Industry - MM PE 1

EUROTRANS, as a federation, plays a pivotal role in representing and supporting the European power transmission industry. Its influence and scope are significant, encompassing over 600 enterprises across Europe. These enterprises collectively contribute to an impressive annual production value exceeding 40 billion Euros, underscoring the economic significance of the sector.

The European region is renowned globally for its innovative prowess and extensive experience in the power transmission sector. This industry is a substantial employment generator, providing jobs to over 160,000 individuals. The responsibility of EUROTRANS in advocating for and supporting these employees and their companies is substantial, especially considering the diverse national needs and contexts within Europe.

In essence, EUROTRANS functions as a crucial intermediary and advocate, ensuring that the interests of a vital and economically significant sector are effectively represented and addressed at various levels, including national and international platforms. The organization's role in fostering innovation, promoting best practices, and advocating for the sector's needs is integral to the continued growth and sustainability of the European power transmission industry.

We asked a several key questions to Mr. Salim Haffar, The President at EUROTRANS, to cover a range of topics from his personal experiences and roles to broader industry trends, challenges, and future outlooks. 

You can see the video version of the interview here: https://youtu.be/0-pJ_EFinXs

To interact and connect with Mr. Salim Haffar you can join the Bearing & Power World Meetings from 10 to 12 June 2024 in Istanbul. More information can be found at http://www.bearing-power.com


contact: marketing@imotion.media

#PowerTransmission #EUROTRANS #Podcast #SalimHaffar #MotionMasters

Transcript

Hello and welcome to the Motion Masters, the masters of industrial motion podcast!

The world hums with the unseen symphony of gears and bearings within the power transmission industry. But, who are the conductors, the masterminds behind this hidden Orchestra?
Welcome to Motion Masters where we pull back the curtain on the unseen Heroes who keep the world in motion.

I'm Jigar, your host. Join me as we unravel the mysteries of power transmission industry. Subscribe now and together let's explore the unseen forces that keep the world in motion one gear at a time.

In our inaugural episode, we are honored to host one of the most important figure of the industry Mr Salim Haffar. President of Eurotrans and Deputy General Manager at iMak Gearbox. He's not just the head of a European Powerhouse, but a visionary, champion of progress, and a man with a wealth of knowledge to share.

Today's episode is a deep dive into the European Power Transmission Industry. We are going to ask several questions to Mr Haffar to cover a range of topics from his personal experiences and roles to broader industry trends, challenges and future outlooks. So, welcome Mr Haffar.

Thank you very much. Thank you for the invitation. It's a pleasure for me to be here and it's a pleasure for me also to see that people are working on new format and a new way of presenting our industry and our network. As Eurotrans, I think this is exact the same philosophies, putting people together, so it's fantastic for me to be here. Thank you!

Thank you. Before I ask you the first question, could you please give us a little bit of introduction of Eurotrans?

Well, Eurotrans is a federation that is putting together Association from different European countries. So, it was founded more than 50 years ago now. As it was founded in 69. And now today, we have members from the UK, from France, from Italy, Belgium, Switzerland, Turkey and Finland. So, it's a very broad range of members that we have, that we put together at the same table, to discuss and address the different challenges of our industry.

Let me start by asking, can you describe your journey to becoming the president of Eurotrans?

Well, my journey was first of all full of very interesting meetings, full of very nice networking. And I think, this would be the main line of my experience in Eurotrans is, to become president you you first need to play a very active role. It's all about meeting people, it's all about discussing with people, following trends, and having and bringing passion for that. Because, without this this passion you cannot go further in this.

You already briefly mentioned, but I still wanted to know a little bit more about what does a typical day in your role involve? What you look after?

Well, as a federation we don't have, I would say, typical days but I would say that we have long-term action, long-term roles. Because, the Federation as you said in the introduction is an umbrella that is getting together different associations. So, I would say that the typical week or the typical month or the typical activities of a president of Eurotrans, but also the people that are working with me, is to get the people together first, is to follow different trends, and to advocate for our industry on a European level but also on a worldwide level as well.

What are the primary objectives and functions of Eurotrans?

Well, the Eurotrans which is now more than 50 years (old) is still keeping the same pillars from the beginning. So, we are focusing on networking. So, we are focusing on bringing the people together, the associations together, but also, the people that work in this industry together. That's the first pillar which will be networking. The second one will be about statistics we try to follow. The trends we try to follow, statistics we try to follow number and share this with our different members. And, the third one will be training. So, the Eurotrans is a Federation of Excellence. We we try to provide excellence through the standards, we also try to provide excellence via sharing the knowledge to the different members. Sharing this knowledge to different people that are within the industry and in all different levels. We have trainings for people working in factories, we also have a training for managers, for engineers. So, it's a very wide range of trainings that we propose within the association.

Is there any other additional support do you provide to the member companies?

Well, we provide a lot of of different support and especially in this period, we provide this platform to be together. We provide support by being the voice of the of the industry. We have a lot of discussion with the lawmakers in Europe, but we also have a lot of discussion with other Association worldwide to make sure we all go in the same line and to make sure we defend, let's say, the vision first of our members, but to also make sure that we defend the interest of our industry in line with the other associations on different International level.

Talking about the industry, what are the current trends do you see in the European power transmission industry?

The current trends, I would say that there's one trend that continues for many years now, and that is a top priority for our industry, is to focus on sustainable practices, to focus on the integration of advanced technologies like Internet of Things. Now, we talk more and more about artificial intelligence to integrate this well in the production side, but to also integrate this in the product that we are providing to customers at the end of the day. So I would say that we have two main focus now in our industry, two main trends, I would say. The first one would be digitalization and the second one would be sustainability. And I think that we all agree that these two goals and these two trends are working together and they are perfectly matching together. But we have another trend as well that is coming out as a result of this is that we try to provide more efficient products. We try to provide easy maintenance for our product, but we also try to provide product that lasts longer in the time to reduce the carbon footprint at the end of the journey of the product. If the product has a longer lifetime, it's a lower carbon footprint at the end of the day.

There's so many innovations must be taking place in order to go that far, how is innovation shaping the future of the industry?

I think the innovation is shaping the industry with these new trends we need now. The customers, for many years, they had this need, but they need to follow up their product. They need to know what was using their product. So I think that the traceability is something that is playing a big role in innovation from the production side, but also from end product side. So by doing this innovation, we are reinventing our industry. Also with enhancing all these subject for efficiency, we are also changing all the industry and we are also making innovation on all different levels. And the last point I would say that is very important for our members is this collaboration. So I think here we can come back more on the role of Eurotrans and how it work on innovation. We try to make this collaboration between member easier. To have this complementarity, to put all these forces together, to bring more excellence in innovation, to make the work of our members easier, if they communicate together, if they all go together in the same direction, at the end it's the whole industry that is benefiting from this different innovation and trends.

That's great. Again, I want to understand now the importance of the industry and how big the industry is. So, can you elaborate on the economic significance of the industry, particularly in terms of job creation and GDP contribution?

Well, you said it at the introduction, but today, the power transmission industry in Europe represent more than 40 billion of turnover. So that's just a turnover made by our different member companies within Europe, which is a big contribution to the European GDP. But also in the same time, you have to imagine all these micro companies, all these companies, all these foundries, all these steel companies that are also working behind our industry to provide us all the raw material, to provide us all the different components used for our industry. So I would say that this is 40 billion but it's it's much more important than that. And we also have a very important contribution because our parts are used in a lot of different sectors that range from the Aerospace to the Agriculture and the food industry, chemical plants, and everything. So we are almost everywhere. So I would say that we are the hiding part that are giving motion and movement to the industry. So our role and our contribution to GDP is even more important than 40 billion. In the same time talking about individual employment, we now have more than 160 (160 thousand) employees that are directly working with our members. So if you add and put together the thousand of people that are working in the industry, that's a big part of the European working force and it's growing. I can say that our industry is hiring more and more people, and in all different levels, that's from engineer to operators. Our sector is doing well and is constantly recruiting on all different levels.

That's great. But this must have come with the challenges as well. So, how does the industry navigate economic challenges like recessions and the market fluctuations?

Well, I think that first we have challenges shared with all the counterparts of the European economy. This geopolitical changes, all these change in laws with other counterparts, with other part of the world. So there's a lot of challenge coming from, I would say, from a macro point of view. But out of these, we have our own challenges for the industry. As I said before, the industry is trying to go for a greener industry with having, let's say, lower carbon footprint. So that's a lot of change in our own production, so that's a big challenge, a big investment for our members. So that will be the first challenge. The second challenge is to work on strategic planning. It's, you know, before we used to make plans on two, three, four, five, 10 years. But now, if we know what's going to happen in six years, it's a big achievement. So the second challenge I would say will be on the strategy planning. And the last one, and I think that's where Eurotrans is trying to play a lot of roles, and it's a challenge shared with other industries is a lack of workers. It's getting harder and harder to motivate young people to come and work in our industry. We have now older wave of people, of very skilled Engineers, that are being retired and we are struggling to put people in their place. And that's where Eurotrans is playing a big role with all these trainings that we provide to our members, but we also try to work a lot with universities, try to promote all these work on standards, try to make this power transmission, try to show actually, we don't try to make it more interesting, but we just try to show and clearly explain in all transparency that the power transmission is a very interesting field of work for young engineers. Just imagine that people working in our industry are working on projects, on rover, that are going to be in Mars. They are working on projects to solve the water issues, as we have member working on providing gearboxes for the water treatment, but we also work on how to provide and how to produce more sustainable raw materials. So we work in lot of different fields, but the fact that we've been always sitting in the in the back side I would say, now we try to put us back on the front side and try to show to young people how our industry is interesting. And I'm confident for the future, I'm confident that we will overpass all these challenges. Because we are busy working on that, we're busy working on different solutions. But we will only be able to find a solution by being together. And that's why, I think, there is a big role for Association and Federation like us in putting back people together on the same table and going in the same direction.

This is extraordinary work what you're doing! Because young engineers, they're always afraid, in time of uncertainty, who is there to look after them? And what you mentioned it just sound like helping them, you know, overcome that fear. So moving on, let's go back to sustainability a little bit. How is the industry addressing environmental sustainability?

We do a lot of different changes in our production. The way we produce our products to make greener factories. We also try to be more and more careful about the goods and components that we are using within our own products. But in the same time, we are trying to address this by providing products that are more efficient, that are more adapted to the expectation of the market, to factories that are trying to reduce their carbon footprint. So we are playing on the two sides of the board here. We try to reduce our own carbon footprint, one producing the gearbox or other different components, but also we are helping our customers to reduce their own footprint.

And, what role does Eurotrans play in promoting green practices within the industry, especially those small manufacturers who have no means to cater to the environmental and sustainability practices?

Actually, we don't have small or big members. We put everybody in the same level in our industry. And I think that's what's very interesting with our industry, that small players, big players, they all sit at the same table, they all use the same standards, they all try to go in the same direction. And I think, that's why our industry is going towards excellence. Because we have very small members, single man companies, that are dealing with the big projects and they cannot ignore these standards, they cannot ignore all these different trends, and we are always here to remind them, we are always here to share with them these different trends. So we make sure that no one is left at the end of the train.

Very well said. Now, I want to switch the gear a little bit to talk about the policies and the regulations. So, what are the key regulatory challenges industry is facing today?

The key regulation, I think the biggest one that we have now will be this carbon tax that is slowly being implemented within Europe. I think it will change our industry, because most of the part, I would say, used in our products would be impacted by this new law. So people have to reinvent they Supply Chain, they have to reinvent the way they produce, reinvent where they buy, how they buy. So I think they will completely need to reinvent themselves with these new laws.

And, how do Eurotrans work with the European government to shape industry friendly practices?

Well, we have a direct role there. We are very present with all our different European associations, that play a direct role within their own countries speaking with their own government, with their own ministries, to present and to explain the different trends and needs of our industry. But ourself, we play a very important role within Europe as we are always following the new laws. We are always bringing our idea, bringing our position toward the different decision that are going to be taken. But we play also a role out of Europe as we are the direct counterpart of big associations in Asia but also in North America as well.

You're talking about Asia, North America, I'm coming to international relations now. How does the European power transmission industry compare with the global counterparts?

Well, how do we compare, I think we try to do this with lot of communication. We try to do this with, trying to put everybody on the same table. So we try to have a very active role in communication, in sitting with our counterpart Association, discussing the the different challenges on one side, but also sitting together and trying to define the trends for the future. What are the different adjustment that should be done, where our industry is going, and by taking all this information - by having all these discussions we can come back to our members, we can come back to our law makers, and tell them where the world of power transmission is going on International level.

What are the long-term goals of Eurotrans?

Well, the long-term goals of our industry first of all is to keep our member together, is to keep the discussion open, is to create more and more events, is to make sure that the industry still have skilled workers, that European industry still have skilled workers. So it's obviously to work on more trainings, to work on more standards, to work on more being together. So that's from the different long term (goals) for the Eurotrans Association itself. And also we have other long-term goals that we share with our industry members is to continue innovation. Continue to develop what is making the excellence of the European power transmission is cutting edge technology, and more efficient products, a greener production. So it's to bring everybody on the same level, but always do more, always do better. So I think we still have a lot of work. So the the agenda of Eurotrans will be full for the many more years to come.

I want to talk a little bit about the challenges now. Covid-19 pandemic shaken up the whole world. How Eurotrans is preparing for the uncertainties and challenges in the future if they may come, and the opportunities in the industry?

Well, first of all Covid obviously was a challenge for everybody. But I think that our industry shown a great resilience and a great adaptivity for that. And the association itself, we really quickly moved to the digital world. We completely reorganized the meetings, moving toward digital meetings, which actually brought us a lot of different advantages. And now we are slowly, we came back to the normal. But we try to keep this as an advantage, to be more flexible, to be on different platforms. So that would be the first challenge that we had to address and that we had to adapt in the last few years. As per the different, in your question, different challenge that we will have in future, and I will repeat myself again, but the main challenge is having skilled workers, is having people. Because it's a mechanical world, it's a mechanical sector in which we are working. But behind all these gears and bearings is a very talented engineers, is a skilled workers, is passionate people that work on these standards, on this innovation. And so I think this will be the biggest challenge that we will have to face, and for which we are being more and more prepared now with all the action that we are doing. The last point that I would like to add also is, we need to be together, we need to sit together, we need to meet together. I think that's the biggest challenge that we will have to face in the future as the world is being more and more going into opposition, more and more going into different sides. I think this where Eurotrans have to play an important role in bringing people together, as we used to do for many years. We speak the same language, mechanical engineering, the language of innovation, language of trends, the language of of standards. And I think this the main message that we are carrying around. So we also continue to support all these different discussion, the different events that are made for an industry. And I think that's why it's a big pleasure for me to be here with you, to have this this open discussion on our industry, on our trends. And I think we need to support more and more such kind of action and initiatives.

Talking about the events, by the way, let me ask you, are you able to join bearing and power transmission event organized by bearing news and motion and drives magazine in Istanbul?

We were there last year as well and I actually did the opening speech of this event. It was a great pleasure for me to somehow play the match at home and having people from so many different countries meeting in the same place. And for next year we will be there as well from the organization and also from a company point of view we will be there. Because as I said in the previous answer to your question is, it's important to be together, to sit together, to discuss together, to network together, and that's how we will keep this excellence by putting people together. So well, we will be there yeah.

Okay. You mentioned briefly about the engineers and the talent you need in the industry and that could be the potential challenge in the future. But those engineers come also from the diverse background. What initiatives has Eurotrans taken to promote diversity and inclusion within the industry?

Eurotrans by itself is diversity. Because it's a federation that is putting together association from several different countries. So we now have associations from Germany, from France, from Turkey, from the UK, from Switzerland, from Finland, from Italy as well that are sitting together, discussing together, and trying to find solution together. And trying to see how this diversity of culture and realities can help us to address the different challenges of the industry. And speaking about the diversity and inclusion, I think that I will be the best illustration for that. As I have a French and Moroccan background, I work in a Turkish company, but I'm leading now a European association. And I think that what I represent is also represented in most of our members. And it's always very interesting to have meetings with our different members and we very quickly get into discussion with people from five, 10, 20, 30 different countries, and sitting at the same table is very interesting. And I think, that diversity is also a solution, mixity is also a solution for future. And all our members are open to engineers coming from all over the world, whatever their culture background or whatever the professional background. The industry is opening it's hands to talents from all over the world actually, yeah.

These diverse background also come with a lot of requirements, demands and needs. How do you ensure that the needs of all member countries are fairly represent?

Well, as I said before, Eurotrans is a federation. So it's a federation that is having and sitting with the association members. So that's what is very nice with this federation is that we sit with the represented, high representatives of this association that are already sitting with their own members, and trying to analyze, trying to focus on the main challenges of their own market, the main challenges of their own members. And then they all come together with, I would say, a short list of their priorities. So we are already sitting there with the top priorities. So when we sit in Eurotrans meeting, we have people that come back, come to us I would say, with their own priorities. So we make sure that we listen to all of this, and we make sure we come to solutions on the European level. Because what's happening is that these members, when they come with their needs and their demands, it mean that they they did manage to solve them maybe on the national level or it means that these companies are playing on international level. So they need to have answers from a federation that is addressing international challenges, that is following international trends. It don't mean that the association is not able to answer them, but it mean that we give an even better answer when we are sitting all together.

What has been your most significant challenge as a president of Eurotrans?

Well, I don't think that I had any challenge. Maybe this is a way of thinking, but I think that all challenges are chances for personal development, for association development. So I've been very lucky to travel a lot with the association, meeting with people from a lot of different countries, throwing bridges toward different cultures. So I don't see any kind of challenges, I only see chances. I only see opportunities of meeting with new peoples, having ideas on different point of views and following the trends from different perspectives. Because many things are happening in the world, but it's always interesting to to listen the point of view of different people, so it gives you different perspectives. So it makes it not easier, but it makes the solution only better. Because you have different point of view, different perspectives. So I think I don't see any kind of challenges, I only see opportunities. So it's all positive for me, it's only positive for me. Because association people is a very rare spicy now, we are struggling to find people to work with us, we are struggling to find people that want to represent, that want to give off their time and energy to represent the industry. So that would be the the biggest challenge to find people to represent industry. But from the same time when you sit at a table with these people, they are all people that know the industry. They're all people that have big experience, that have an incredible international background and different cultural background. So it's always very interesting. Whoever end up at Eurotrans table already did a lot of amazing job within their own industry, their own company and their own association. So I think it's a it's only a chance and not a challenge for me to be sitting at this table, yeah.

Again, going back to the engineers and the aspirant. So what advice would you give to young professionals aspiring to work in the industry?

Well, the main advice that I will give to young professional is to be curious. You know, to be curious. Because you're always as good as you're curious. You need to be interested, you need to understand the different fields, the different sectors where we are working. And this is how you can bring added value to your company, this is how the company can bring you added value. I mean, if you run after knowledge, if you run after opportunities, you will only create opportunity for your company but for yourself at the end of the day. I always leave this example, I've been very lucky to travel to more than 70 countries with my personal and professional experience. And it's all because I've been believing in the job that I do, and I've have been believing in different opportunities. And what was a job opportunity at the beginning, end up being a fantastic personal opportunity for myself, my personal development. So stay curious, always try to learn, and always remember that you are very lucky to work in the world of power transmission. Because it's a door for an infinite word, and our industry will continue to grow. And we will always be focusing on new subjects, new trends. So you are sure that you will develop yourself, develop your knowledge, and work on very interesting subjects, yeah and projects.

We hope that the viewers are taking note of what you just said, very important advice. Since this is the first episode, I wanted to ask you what advice do you have for a podcast like this, which is first of it's kind in the industry or one of it's kind in the industry. Do you have any advice, suggestions, guidance for us as we take this podcast forward?

Well, for me it was a very nice experience. It was very dynamic. I think that the main advice that I can have is to continue on the same path and continue to bring people together from different size and corner of our industry. So I think it's a very nice job that you are doing here, trying to bring some more digital aspect to our industry. So it's fantastic, just continue on the same line.

Last question, what excites you the most about the future of the European power transmission industry or let's say not just European but worldwide, overall industry?

Well, what's very exciting is that our members and our companies continue to develop constantly. They constantly reinvent themselves, they constantly add new version to the products, they constantly change their world of production. So it's going very fast, you know. It's a sector that is not staying at the place, it's always running after new things. And it's very interesting, you know, I'm always excited to visit factory from members, you know, to see how they reinvent their production. With all these new subjects, sustainability, digitalization, it's always impressive to see how they change everything in only few years. So it's only excited to imagine how it's going to be in 5, 10, 20 years, so that's the first exciting part. The other exciting part is the international perspective of this sector. We have members of the European power transmission industry that are present in 60 - 70 different countries. So it's very nice to see how our members are adapting to different markets, how they are bringing solutions to different realities of all these countries where they are working. So it's always exciting to see the adaptability of these these member companies. So well, I'm very excited for the future, that's what I can say, yeah.

Thank you so much Mr Haffar for your time. This brings us to the end of this podcast, episode one. We hope we will catch up with you very soon and at latest we will see you at the event in Istanbul, in June.

Well, thank you! And well, see you very soon in Istanbul. Thank you for your time as well. And one more time, thank you for bringing people of the industry together.