True technicians

Entering the Herculesweg in Middelburg, one cannot miss the remarkable premises of engineering company Draftec. Still, only few people in the region are aware of what this young company actually does. It is now time for a change.

“We are basically strong in everything that happens in, on, and near water,” Mr Boone comments.
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Speaking with both of Draftec’s owners Mr Martijn Boone and Mr Martijn Holtkamp, it becomes clear in just a split second that you are dealing with two true technicians. The company that was founded in 2009 specialises in engineering for high-end hydraulic, electric, and mechanical systems. Draftec’s strength, fed by the educational skills and experience of both owners, lies in mechatronics, a relatively new technical development in which mechanics, electronics, and IT merge. But they are both fully aware of the fact that offering high quality engineering services is no guarantee for expansion.

Top of mind

Mr Holtkamp comments, “We have recently been able to obtain a proper market share in the offshore wind industry, with projects for many returning customers. This industry has ample potential, for instance for hydraulic systems that use mechatronic solutions. Measuring and controlling IT-operated systems are becoming increasingly common in this industry. This is of course great news, as this market segment still holds a lot potential for us. But it doesn’t feel right for us to depend on one market too much, and we also notice that our competition is increasing. We are, after all, not the only company that sees offshore wind as an interesting market.” Mr Boone adds, “This is why we wish to profile ourselves in a wider market. We still have a large number of founding customers that are not offshore wind-related. But we also acknowledge that there are a lot of companies in our region that don’t know Draftec, and it is a wasted opportunity not to be top of mind among them.”

Attract business

Direct business generation is one reason for Draftec to engage in better profiling. Doing business with companies in the region, which are usually relatively small to midsize businesses like Draftec, yields another interesting opportunity. “For smaller companies, it is difficult to get on the shortlist of projects for larger industries outside our region. They furthermore prefer one stop shopping, hereby missing the opportunities our region has to offer in a broad range of industrial and technical services,” Mr Holtkamp explains. “Working together could make us all a serious partner for the bigger companies. But for this to happen, we must first know each other and each other’s capabilities.” Draftec has therefore recently become a ZPPC participant. “ZPPC, like several other business communities that we participate in, gives us the opportunity to talk to lots of relevant companies. We can then learn what they can mean to us, and vice versa,” adds Mr Boone. “With this knowledge, we can attract business from bigger projects for ourselves and for other local contractors.”

Customer-supplier relation

Looking at Draftec’s expertise, the company has certainly evolved from an engineer into a company that also takes care of realisation and commissioning. With all of its proper in-house knowledge and experience, overall project management is also part of the portfolio. “We are basically strong in everything that happens in, on, and near water,” Mr Boone comments. “Because of our experience in hydraulics, we are also settled in the heavy-lift industry and in industries that require heavy lifting.” “It is good to see that a lot of projects often lead to new ones due to the customer-supplier relations that we have created,” Mr Holtkamp adds. Sometimes we help a customer, and other times the customer helps us with a project.”

Turbulent years

As a customer-oriented company, Draftec knows how to extract the exact problems that customers want to solve. The people at Draftec know when to ask the right questions, even when these sound critical towards the customer. It is Draftec’s firm opinion that acting in this way leads to the best solutions. With this in mind, it is no surprise that this has resulted in ample satisfied, returning customers. “The last few years have been very turbulent,” Mr Boone tells. “Our number of employees grew and we moved to another building. To be honest, our success has also turned into somewhat of a burden for us. Our customers are used to discussing their projects with Mr Holtkamp or myself, as we are able to translate their problem into several disciplines. That enables us to act both flexibly and fast. We obviously cannot be everywhere at the same time, so we had to make choices. Our strength should certainly not become our weakness and by expanding and optimising our organisation, we hope to be able to deal with this situation effectively.”

Production facility

With an eye on further growth, Draftec decided to move to their current location in Middelburg. The next step will probably be the realisation of a production facility. Mr Holtkamp, “Today, we only have limited possibilities for construction. Larger items that we are now working on are constructed on site or at the site of partners that we work with. This is at times inconvenient, especially when we want to show prospects what we are doing. We are therefore investigating the possibility of constructing a production hall. We have plenty of room available for this expansion over here. We expect that having sufficient production space here will also lead to cost reductions.”

True technicians: Mr Martijn Boone, Mr Michel Schouwenaar and Mr Martijn Holtkamp (Photo courtesy of Scherp! Fotografie).
HerenDRAFTEC 2

 

High-end lifting solutions

About two years ago, Draftec became involved with a new company called Scaldon. Scaldon specialises in high-end (offshore) lifting solutions, such as cranes, A-frame, and winches. The Scaldon brand may be relatively new to the market, but the people behind it share over a decade of experience in hoisting equipment and in the design and construction of hydraulic and electrical control systems. Commercial Director at Scaldon Michel Schouwenaar joins in, “Draftec is a specialist in designing and constructing crane control units. T The idea originated to start constructing complete cranes. The bankruptcy of one of their clients created the opportunity to enter the crane construction market. At Scaldon we can design, engineer, construct, test, and service cranes and other types of lifting and hoisting equipment with a maximum lifting capacity of 1,500t. Today our focus lies on the maintenance and service of existing equipment, but our aim is to expand activities in the complete construction of lifting equipment. When we started our business, the market situation was not great. Although I knew a lot of relevant companies, this did not lead to any business. But now things are changing in a positive way. We have plenty of work from the maritime and offshore industry, such as service, maintenance, testing, and certification of equipment on board of vessels. We have also designed equipment, including a heave compensated winch for an offshore crane.”

A Scaldon crane

Although the two companies are closely linked, the difference between Scaldon and Draftec is evident. Mr Boone states. “People will never speak of Draftec as a product brand. A control unit may be labelled as ‘designed by Draftec’, but it will never be a Draftec control unit. This should however change for Scaldon. In the near future, one might talk of a Scaldon crane or a Scaldon winch.” A lot is clearly going on behind the walls of the impressive Draftec building. “No matter what happens, we will always be technicians that really listen to our customers,” Mr Holtkamp says. “Each project, big and small, has our full attention. We stick to one-off projects, as serial work is not our strength. We will continue to expand our knowledge and experience with a large variety of projects.” Mr Boone concludes, “One of our main challenges for this will be finding the right people. We employ genuine technicians that love to solve problems by means of searching for new solutions. This requires a certain amount of flexibility from them as well, which will be highly appreciated in the industries that we work for.”

www.draftec.nl

www.scaldon.nl

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