Prominent Businessman Prapat Phupinyokul

     Mölnlycke Health Care AB is one of the world’s leading manufacturers and suppliers of single-use surgical and wound care products with its corporate headquarters in Göteborg, Sweden. Mölnlycke Health Care has various sales offices and manufacturing sites all over the globe.
     The surgical assortment is mainly single-use surgical gown and drape under the two brand names Klinidrape and BARRIER and procedure tray, which is a package containing all the sterile single-use products used for a surgical intervention under ProcedurePakTM brand. Tendra is the brand for wound care products.
     The history of Molnlycke Health Care (Thailand) can be traced back to 1990, when it was established as a joint venture between Berli Jucker Public Company Limited, which holds 51 percent of share and Mölnlycke Health Care AB of Sweden with 49 percent of share under the name “Thai Klinipro Company Limited”. In October 2001, Mölnlycke Health Care AB acquired the 51 percent share from Berli Jucker, making it sole owner of the company.
     As a result, the company’s name was subsequently changed to Molnlycke Health Care (Thailand) Limited in the beginning of 2002. The company’s new name enhances the company’s sense of unity with other worldwide subsidiaries in Mölnlycke Health Care Group. It also increases the international image of the company, as the name of Mölnlycke is well known all over the world for its high quality single-use surgical and wound management products.
     Molnlycke Health Care (Thailand) Limited manufactures only single-use surgical gowns and specialty drapes for 100 percent global export. There are two factories -one in Bangplee Industrial Estate and the other as a new factory in Amata Nakorn. The purpose of establishing the second factory is to increase production capacity in order to cope with its future growth. In addition, in 2001, the same year the second factory was built, the mother company acquired Johnson & Johnson single-use surgical product line including the famous BARRIER @ brand.
     “Thailand still has very low market penetration on single-use surgical gowns and drapes,” says Mr. Prapat.
     “But we can see great opportunity that the products can fast expand in the future as they provide better protection and deliver optimal conditions for safe surgical procedures,” he adds.
     Molnlycke Health Care (Thailand) Limited runs its operations under BOI promotional privileges as well as both quality management systems, such as ISO 9001:2000 and ISO 13485:2003 as well as US FDA Quality System Regulation and ISO 14001 environmental management system.
     The company aims to be the customers’ most highly valued supplier and reach the number one position globally for surgical products. It provides first class and innovative single-use products and services and is committed to creating long-term customer satisfaction through dedication to patients and professionals in the health care sector.
     “Our management style is to be business minded, be customer focused, be pro-active and open, act with heart and care and generate trust, while our attitude shall focus on energy, passion and respect,” says Mr. Prapat.
     Mr. Prapat graduated from Kasetsart University with a degree in Mechanical Engineering in 1981 and later completed MBA from Thammasat University. He initially worked as a Senior Engineer at Toyota Motor Thailand for four years. He gained a lot of valuable work experience, particularly in engineering related field and Japanese management style. His expertise back then was machine design and production efficiency improvement.
     Then in 1985, he joined Thai Sancella, which was a newly established joint venture between Berli Jucker and the former Mölnlycke Consumer Products of Sweden as, Deputy Factory Manager. The company produced sanitary napkins with advanced technology from Sweden mainly for domestic market.
     His responsibility was to set up everything concerning manufacturing, starting from building the modern factory, recruiting the team, setting up systems and installing a highly sophisticated automatic machine. To do this, he was trained for two months in the Netherlands and Norway. With success, he was later promoted as Factory Manager at the age of 28.
     In 1991, Mr. Prapat was promoted General Manager at Molnlycke Health Care (Thailand) Limited. He believes that the company is a fantastic place to work since he can learn a lot and at the same time he can further develop his management skills, especially the conceptual ones for international management. Chances for taking more challenges also exist within the company.
     For the previous achievements at Molnlycke Health Care (Thailand) Limited, Mr. Prapat believes that he has successfully built a competent and strong management team as well as a skillful and dedicated workforce as the company achieved a strong business growth reflecting by an average eleven- year sales growth rate of 38 percent during 1992 through 2003. This can be seen by the sales volume of BT 105 million in 1992, and reaching at the level of BT 3,500 million in 2003.
     “I also believe that we have been one of the world’s most recognized, in terms of most competent and cost efficient, manufacturers of single-use surgical gowns and drapes,” remarks Mr. Prapat.
     “We are proud of being an important part of Molnlycke Health Care in creating long term customer satisfaction through dedication to patients and professionals in the health care sector,” he adds.
     Mr. Prapat sees that it is a great experience with good opportunity to work with Molnlycke Health Care, which is rich in mixed nationality and culture diversity.
     “I am personally fascinated by cultural empathy. It is a pity that a lot of business people put less effort or even ignore to learn or understand the culture which is different and important,” he comments.
     “I always feel that I am a Thai but with continuously reaping benefits of learning and understanding different cultures especially the Swedish one as I have been working with Swedes for almost 20 years,” he adds.
     Mr. Prapat says that one thing he really likes about the company is its decentralization system, which is extremely effective. The company has no Swedish top management, which indicates that they trust the locals to do the job well although this is a giant operation. The Swedish management gives Thais the opportunity to work and prove themselves that they are capable and competent. The mother company is not too involved and lets the locals manage the operations on their own.
      “I believe that I have absorbed a lot of Swedish culture from the company, including its management and leadership styles as well as ways of thinking,” says Mr. Prapat.
     Apart from taking an active role as General Manager of Molnlycke Health Care (Thailand) Limited, Mr. Prapat is also a Director of Board of Governors of Thai-Swedish Chamber of Commerce.
     “I am active in membership and event working committee,” says Mr. Prapat.
     “I personally believe that we have a fair chance to successfully face our challenges which are to increase the number of members and bring more Thais to join as well as to create more attractive events,” he adds.
     Mr. Prapat enjoys working with his team and for the chamber and hopes to extend his networking and contribute more to the chamber and its members.

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