At the height of the Asian crisis, a German contractor cancelled an assignment to upgrade an Indonesian cement factory. The company then turned to Mr. Hans Jorgen Nielsen, whom they knew from his past job as Regional Representative for the Danish cement machinery manufacturer FLS.
That became the start of LV Technology, which over an impressively short period of time has moved up into the ranks of the largest Danish companies in Thailand. Since 1998, the company has doubled – year on year – both its turnover and its number of employees.
Hans Jorgen Nielsen has always trusted his own instincts. When he was asked to take on the job in Indonesia, 45,000 foreign experts had already left the country due to the 80 percent drop in the value of the Indonesian Rupiah and their fear of the social and political unrest, which swept the country.
Hans Jorgen Nielsen, who had just established his engineering consulting company, never considered to leave. He saw the no-show of the German contractor as his big chance.
Hans Jorgen Nielsen was given a free hand. His unique idea was a new design of the separator which is the last station before the raw material enters the mill. When completed, his calculations proved to hold. The plant not only saved raw material, they also made a substantial savings on their energy consumption, which is one of the major costs for all cement plants world wide.
“I made the basic design for the renovation myself, while another company was contracted to implement it,” he recalls.
“We achieved the planned savings in both raw material and energy. Consequently the investment in implementing this new design was paid back in less than a year.
An improvement in the quality of the manufactured cement turned out to be an unexpected free added benefit.
“The timing was perfect. In times of economic recess, manufacturers start focus on cost saving measures and become more cost conscious. So they were all ready to listen when we explained what we could do for them.”
Today, LV Technology has been contracted to perform more than 200 similar and other renovations of cement factories all over Asia as well as in many other parts of the world. LV Technology will typically produce the technical design on the renovation. The actual implementation will then mostly be carried out by local engineering companies contracted by the cement plant itself.
With the projects currently completed, LV Technology has already saved planet Earth more energy than a large Danish power plant may produce per year. The renovations also result in the cement plants releasing less CO2 to the environment
In establishing his company, Hans Jorgen Nielsen selected Bangkok. His first registration of share capital in the new company was only the basic 2 mill. Baht needed for a work permit for one foreigner – himself.
Today, LV Technology employs 60 people of whom five are Scandinavians. Most are employed on a profit sharing scheme which rewards personal results.
“Only five of our people have left us over the close to five years, we have been established,” he adds.
“Most of our people both in the company in Thailand and a subsidiary, which we have established in India, are employed on local conditions. That makes us highly competitive on special jobs tailor made to each individual client – jobs which the major players on the world market cannot undertake.”
“We don’t have any unions to hold back our growth either. We just have to ensure that each person is satisfied and functions well in a meaningful job,” he adds.
Recently, LV Technology has started to diversify into other business sectors. The first designs for a mining company have been implemented in South Africa with a positive result.
Looking into his calendar, travel plans for the next few months are scheduled to as diverse countries as Iran, Indonesia, Greece, Lebanon and Brazil. Meanwhile, the company will move down a few floors in the KPN Tower, where it has been situated for the last two years, to occupy 700 square meters.
The move to introduce LV Technology on the Thai MAI stock exchange – which is the alternative listing for SME’s – is intended to finance a continuation of the rapid expansion of the company. The introduction to take place later this year is likely to be a main subject of conversation at a reception on 17 June to be presided over by HE Mr. Ulrik Helweg-Larsen, Ambassador of Denmark to Thailand. The reception marks the move of LV Technology to more spacious locations in the KPN Tower in Bangkok where the rapid expansion of the company may be better accommodated.
“A few years ago I offered formers business partners to buy into LV Technology. I was willing to sell half of the shares. The deal was never concluded, but if at that time they had taken up my offer, they would already have had a full return on their investment,” Hans Jorgen Nielsen smiles.
