We Started to Make Agreements with Our Customers for Our First Jigger That Can Work with Knitted Fabric
Interview: Tuğba Karademir
Emre Abdullahoğlu, Deputy General Manager of Armas Makina; “In recent years, we have mostly exported to Slavic countries and the Middle East. In 2025, we want to strengthen our presence in these geographies and our goal will be to be present in the South Asian market.”
Emre Abdullahoğlu, Deputy General Manager of Armas Makina, evaluated 2024 for Tekstil Teknoloji magazine. Abdullahoğlu shared his views on the company’s goals, sustainability plans, and technologies.
What is Armas’ position in the textile machinery market today? Can you give information about your production volume and export figures? What is your goal for the Turkish and world textile machinery market shortly?
Armas Makina was established in Istanbul in 2000 and is a company focused on the development and manufacturing of textile dyeing and finishing machines. Since our establishment; We prioritized providing innovative dyehouse solutions to our customers and implementing these solutions by taking into account customer demands. First of all, our market dominance started with the domestic market’s dynamism; We have strengthened our export capability by increasing it. Now, when we look at the present day, we are one of the first companies that come to mind in the domestic and foreign markets in fabric finishing solutions, especially in the Jigger machine. Our ability to keep up with technology, our reliable after-sales strategy and our team have a great share in this success. Although there is a serious contraction in the domestic and foreign markets in today’s conditions; We did not allow this contraction to make our processes cumbersome, so we were able to keep our order and supply capacity at the same levels. We were able to respond to the demands of our customers in the domestic and foreign markets. Our goal for the coming years; In addition to the innovation and innovation studies we do on our products, we also increase our marketing capabilities; To reach more customers in a more qualified way. The way we have determined this is; First of all, by responding to the demands and needs of our customers, with whom we have been struggling together for years in the domestic market; It will also strengthen our export channels through overseas fairs and our representatives.
Can you give information about the products that Armas Makina has developed in recent years that make a difference in the sector? What distinguishes these products from their competitors in terms of technology or design?
This was a very pertinent question, thank you for that. First of all, I would like to start with the Jigger machine, which is our building block. We have been producing Jigger machines for about 25 years and when we look at the domestic and foreign market now; It is our greatest source of pride to see that even the first machines we manufactured are still used effectively in production lines. However, this success of our product did not leave us behind to make improvements to our machine with an innovative perspective. We do not avoid any R&D investment by focusing on every area where we see technically improvable points. Thus, we not only make our product more reliable and require minimum maintenance, but also increase the production efficiency of our customers and reduce their water and energy use. The biggest innovation and difference I want to mention here is this: Until today, we knew that we could only use Jigger machines with woven fabrics. However, our project, which we have been working on continuously in recent years; was to make our jigger machine so that it can also be used with knitted fabric. As a result of these development studies and long-term tests, we are proud that in recent months we have started to make agreements with our customers for our first pressure jigger that can work with knitted fabric. We named this machine “Knitmaster Jigger”, it is true to its name; We aim to make this product the ruler of knitted fabric. I think so; the difference in the amount of yield, energy and water use it provides in the coming years; It will push the market in the direction of using Jigger in knitted fabrics. The second major difference that we offer as an option in our machine is our Jigger, which we now produce with a wider winding diameter, which we call “XL”. In other words, if our customers request, they can take a look at the “XL” option from our catalog and deal with our Jiggers with winding diameters up to 1400mm. On the production line, this increases manufacturing efficiency by about 30%.
“Our goal in 2025 will be to have a presence in the South Asian market”
Can you give information about your export markets? What are the promising and emerging markets for Armas Makina? What are your growth targets for 2025?
In recent years, we have exported mostly to Slavic countries and the Middle East; We want to strengthen our presence in these geographies in 2025 and our goal will be to have a presence in the South Asian market.
What is Armas Makina’s vision for sustainability and environmentally friendly production? Are there any products you have designed to provide energy efficiency and resource savings?
Environmentally friendly production is always our priority, both because of our motivation in this regard and because the main benefits of our Jigger machine, which is our locomotive product, are less water and low energy consumption. We subject our machines to the necessary tests both in the development and manufacturing phases; Then, after the preliminary examination we make at our customers’ facilities, we design our products most properly for environmentally friendly manufacturing.
How do you integrate digitalization and Industry 4.0 applications into your production processes? How do these changes affect Armas Makina’s productivity and production speed?
As a matter of fact, in companies like us that develop solutions to the problem and implement it; It is not realistic to be able to implement “End-to-end digitalization” 100% in trend terms. Industry 4.0 is mostly valid for businesses that have serial and mold manufacturing lines. However, we do not want to; We benefit from digitalization in every operation where we see the opportunity to increase efficiency and improve capacity. Our connection with Industry 4.0 is essentially to manufacture machines that are conceptualized as “one-end”, suitable for automation and can be operated digitally in line with customer demands. Therefore; We have expert software developers in both our development and after-sales teams. These friends are; responsible for ensuring that the machine works in harmony with the Scada system at the customer’s site.
How do you benefit from your customers’ feedback in your innovation process? What is the role of this feedback in new product development processes?
We never develop and manufacture without involving our customers in the process. Although you theoretically agree with the customer at the beginning of the project; We do not prefer to develop machines without seeing the line and conducting practical experiments. So; We can both take into account our customers’ feedback and incorporate our beneficial ideas into the development process.
What is the structure of your after-sales support services? Can you tell your customers about the maintenance, repair and training services you provide?
After we deliver and install the machine at our customer’s facility, our after-sales technical support team organizes the necessary operative training for the engineers and operators working in the facility. After the start of our machine; First of all, during the first months, we visit our customers at certain intervals and collect their feedback. In addition, since we have never finished our cooperation and connection with our customers, with whom we usually have the opportunity to work once; When it is time for the maintenance of our machine, we stand by our customers.
What do you think about the global economic challenges in 2024 and their impact on the sector? What kind of strategy did you follow as Armas Makina during this period?
To be clear; There is a contraction that we can all feel in both the domestic and foreign markets and that is not only related to our sector, but spreads to the general public. This contraction explains the deterioration in cash flow, the decline in the pace of supply and the discrepancy in the collection balance. We ‘re; We think that the biggest share of these issues belongs to the pandemic, which is one of the most striking disasters of our century. Since we foresee this situation during the pandemic period, we have been making our financial plans accordingly for about 3 years. In this period when investment will slow down and production and order quantities will decrease; As textile machinery manufacturers, we, who are the most committed stakeholders to the investment capability part of this pyramid; We have done our best not to compromise on manufacturing quality and have always planned our cash balance with this purpose. Because there is one point we are sure of; This crisis and market contraction will surely come to an end. Not reducing the quality of products and processes is the first method to overcome this crisis, the way out and the key to success after the crisis.
“We Have Allocated the Largest Budget in Our History to Our Marketing Strategy for 2025-2026”
What steps do you plan to take in terms of new investments, marketing strategies or product development in 2025 and the near future?
Since the nature of our business requires complete commitment to the customer and customer requirements; We always make our planning completely towards product development and catching up with new trends in the textile industry. As a matter of fact; Our primary investment is in R&D processes. However, to reach more customers and increase our business volume, we have created a new marketing strategy. For 2025 and 2026, we have allocated the largest investment budget in our history to this marketing strategy. We aim to continue to announce our products in the market, strengthen our ties with our existing customers with new agreements and expand our volume with new customer collaborations.