Interview with Aşkın Kaya, Sales and Marketing Manager at Sisdoz

We conducted an enjoyable interview with Aşkın Kaya, Sales and Marketing Manager at Sisdoz, in which we discussed the company's areas of activity, the technologies it uses, and its significance for Turkey.

Could you tell our readers about yourself and your professional background?

After graduating from Yıldız Teknik Üniversitesi's Electronics and Communications Engineering Department in 1996, I joined professional working life as a Sales Engineer and worked for approximately 10 years at two different companies in the field of industrial pumps and treatment equipment. Once my knowledge of the market and sector reached a certain level, after managing relations with various institutions and companies within Turkey, and after gaining some managerial experience at my workplaces, my partner, who is an Environmental Engineer, and I decided to explore what else we could do and how we could improve things, so we laid the foundations for Sisdoz A.Ş. in 2008 and have reached where we are today.

What would you like to say about Sisdoz? What do you think is the secret to your success?

Sisdoz has served with a team that has always retained its first-day enthusiasm since the day it was founded. First of all, since our managers are people coming from the field, we have high-level expertise in the process knowledge of all sectors we work in, the problems experienced, and the existing needs. The company has completed its corporate structure with sales, service, logistics, and finance departments, and aims to build continuous and lasting relationships with a customer-focused structure that does not compromise on service quality. When selling products and providing services, we always consider the other side of the table and produce our solutions accordingly. We have a flexible, stable, secure, and continuous structure, and this brings success. We always think long-term; we have never pursued quick fixes and temporary solutions, and this approach has reflected on our business partners, whom we call our customers.

Can you provide information about the sectors you serve and the variety of products you offer?

As Sisdoz, we can have one of our equipment units in every facility and application where there is liquid and air. With pump technologies such as pneumatic diaphragm, mono, hose, magnetic, self-priming, gear, peristaltic, centrifugal, lobe, submersible, metering, piston, electromagnetic, and non-electrical hydraulic, and with material varieties such as PVDF, PP, PE, Teflon, stainless steel, aluminum, Hastelloy, and titanium, we develop solutions for the transfer, circulation, and metering of any type of difficult liquid, including acids, solvents, fuel, sludge, and many other challenging chemicals. In addition to pumps, we have blower products for air vacuum and pressurization, online measurement and control devices for flow, level, pH, conductivity, and chlorine measurements, diffusers that provide fine and coarse bubble air for treatment facilities, and ozone, chlorine gas, and ultraviolet disinfection systems used in water disinfection, which is one of today's important topics. As can be seen, with a diverse product portfolio, we represent approximately 20 different international brands, procure their products, and execute projects by incorporating Sisdoz's strength and knowledge. The main industrial groups we work intensively with are environmental technologies, chemicals, paints and coatings, paper, packaging, machinery manufacturing, food, and plastics sectors.

What is your domestic and foreign sales volume?

Sisdoz, being a distributor company under normal circumstances, initially served only the Turkish market at 100%. However, leveraging our long-standing good relationships with our supplier companies, Turkey's strategic location, and the knowledge and capabilities of the Sisdoz team, we obtained authorization from some of the companies we represent for neighboring countries, former Soviet republics, and Middle East regions, and began exporting. Additionally, the volume of our foreign sales has grown significantly and become important for us in areas such as turnkey metering systems, chlorine gas systems, and disinfection units that we have implemented. For projects involving all types of mechanical and electrical manufacturing, on-site installation, and automation requirements, we have conducted exports and on-site installation applications to countries such as Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Romania, United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Ghana.

What is the importance of technology for Sisdoz? How do you evaluate technology's reflection in your products?

At Sisdoz, we prefer to work with suppliers who develop products, make positive revisions to their equipment according to technological trends, provide us with periodic information on these developments, and offer technical training. By tracking this technology agenda and offering us products, we try to provide added value by using our own knowledge and experience when selling the products of our suppliers both within Turkey and to neighboring countries. In other words, we present global technological developments to the market both through the equipment we sell and through what we add at the application point of this equipment. At the point we have reached now, for example, the efficiency classes of product electric motors are already a much-discussed topic and a situation that needs to be applied. Beyond this, especially in turnkey projects, we carefully analyze our customers' processes and design, build, and operate the system in a way that is most efficient, can be operated with minimal workforce, and minimizes risks that could arise in terms of occupational safety. In terms of innovation, the detail we focus on most is creating correct automation structures so that the system achieves maximum performance with minimum energy. We are conducting serious work and applications especially in chemical metering systems we have built with Prodoz Metering Pumps and Bellin Mono Pumps, as well as in the optimization and operation of Hydro Chlorine Gas and Denora Ozone Systems in terms of the automation and optimal system performance mentioned above.

The stages after the product is delivered to the customer are as important as selling the product. Can you provide information about your after-sales technical service?

Sisdoz Arıtma ve Pompa Teknolojileri San. Tic. AŞ. is a company that manages serious service and maintenance activities. With its experienced technical staff in electrical, mechanical, electronic, and automation fields, it carries out many after-sales activities such as commissioning, periodic maintenance agreements, spare parts supply, and repair services for hundreds of product types from around twenty different brands it represents and for turnkey facilities it designs and builds using its own knowledge, in both workshop and field conditions. In fact, despite being a sales company, we operate certified to ISO 9001:2015 standards, and we carry out our after-sales and installation services with our team and location that hold a Service Competency Certificate under Turkish Standards Institution supervision. We provide these services through our support starting from the correct product selection, with our strong, knowledgeable, standards-compliant team, properly informing and guiding our customers and providing services as required.

What precautions are you taking while producing for a sustainable world?

As you know, energy efficiency is one of the most important steps in protecting nature. The use of renewable energy, reduced fossil fuel consumption, a smaller carbon footprint, and this means lower greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution. Increasing energy efficiency will also help reduce dependence on energy sources, which places a heavy burden on the economy. Like every responsible individual and institution, we try to show sensitivity to energy efficiency in our own field. The Proair Blower, Prodoz Metering Pumps, Proflow Instruments, Gummi Jager Diffusers, Hydro Chlorine Gas Systems, Denora Ozone Disinfection Systems, UV systems, Mono Pumps, Graco and other transfer pumps whose services we provide and whose products we sell—their selection, installation, and proper and efficient operation through our automation applications—we both offer our recommendations and support to our customers and implement our applications in our own turnkey projects with the energy efficiency factor as a priority.

Do you have projects you would like to implement in the coming years? What advantages will these projects bring to your company, your customers, and the industry?

Sisdoz is currently a known, recognized, and preferred company in its field. One of our primary goals is to become a more recognized company in its field in the international market and to produce, especially turnkey projects in both foreign and domestic applications, and to increase their number and volume. Technology and automation are growing in importance in our lives; therefore, our aim is to achieve maximum efficiency not through individual products with daily benefits but through system designs and automation applications, and to execute projects to eliminate or minimize possible errors.

Finally, is there anything else you would like to add?

Sisdoz Arıtma ve Pompa Teknolojileri San. Tic. A.Ş. is a company that continues to rapidly advance its sales and project activities in its field, and has succeeded in participating not only in its own country but also especially in investments in neighboring countries and even on a global scale. You can follow the successful projects and applications in this sense through the Sisdoz website, through face-to-face meetings at trade fairs where we participate, and through trade publications. When needed, the entire Sisdoz team is just a phone call or email away.