How can a small Swedish company keep up with multinational corporations and the emerging competition from Asia? Hemomatik, with its motto “Sensors since 1973”, is concentrating its efforts on conquering a share of the growing market that comes with AI, Internet of things (IoT) and preventive maintenance.
Hemomatik cooperates with sensor specialists, which influences the design. We also have production of our own in Östhammar and Länna ever since 1972. In this way, we can create unique item numbers for our exporting customers and follow them as they move around the globe. We can quote examples of sensor solutions that have been manufactured for 30 years in up to 40,000 units per year. But also solutions where we have made it possible for our customers to save several hundred thousands of kronor of lost production using only two dozen sensors or so.
“We have a turnover of 50 million per year without hiring a single salesperson and with 50 percent of our production going directly to our customers. At the same time, we currently keep probably the largest stock of standard, special and custom-made sensors in Scandinavia. We could perhaps use the old cliché that we set the customer at the centre. We have been doing this for 45 years,” says Erik Moebius and continues: “I tend to say that we set the technical solution at the centre. We often manage to retain our customers for a long time, sometimes up to 30 years”. "Our main market is Sweden and Scandinavia, but our fastest growing market last year was actually China” says Erik.
Hemomatik has given a priority to cooperation with specialist companies in the same industry instead of being absorbed by a larger company. Erik Moebius says that one obstacle over the last 20 years has been the way many large customers have supported, using their purchase departments, a “market monopoly” that often restricts the possibility to choose the latest technology or alternative brands.
"We therefore prefer hiring purchasing managers who do not allow themselves to get hypnotised by the price in kronor, but to look more at overall savings. Standard sensors are usually often a matter of price, assuming that the quality is adequate for the intended application. But to realise a lot of savings, you need to opt for a customised sensor. Our motto is price/performance. For those customers who give us full information, we open our own production to competition, check alternatives from our cooperation partners and openly disclose the alternatives” says Erik Moebius.