We had a very pleasant interview with the Operations Director of Yokeş Makina, Ms. Pınar Yokeş, in this issue of our magazine. Ms. Yokeş shared with us valuable information about the services, manufacturing processes and targets of Yokeş Makina, which has been operating since 1943.
Could you please, briefly tell our readers about yourself and your professional background?
I was born in 1978 in Izmir. I completed my high school degree in Izmir Ozel Turk College and I graduated from Bilkent University. I started my professional career in Istanbul.
I have worked for 12 years in various roles with important names in Turkey’s leading holdings there. Now, I have been contributing to our family company with my knowledge and experience as the 3rd generation family member since 2012.
Yokeş Makina has been operating since 1943. Could you please share with us the stages your company has gone through during these long years?
Yokeş Makina was founded in 1943 in Izmir by my grandfather Mehmet Emin Yokeş as one of the first machining workshops of the city. At that time, we were mainly manufacturing agricultural machinery. Upon the passing away of the founder, Meriç Yokeş, a graduate from
METU, took the reigns of the company.
As of 1972, the company started to work with the paint manufacturing sector upon the demands received and the “ PM Series Vertical – Open Sieve Pearl Mill “ wet grinding machine was first manufactured.
When various machine demands continued to come from different sectors, the company moved to the Birinci Sanayi Sitesi in 1984 in order to expand its production capacity and develop its product portfolio.
In 1998, Mehmet Yalım Yokeş, a graduate from ITU -Mechanical Engineering, Share Holder
and also the Managing Director of our company, took the flag from Mr. Meriç Yokeş.
In these prosesses, our Machines were continued to be manufactured for the Paint, Chemistry, Agrochemical, Cosmetics and Food sectors. Parallel to increased production
volume, we moved to our factory in ITOB Organized Industrial Zone in 2015 where we continue to operate today.
Could you please provide information about the machines you offer to the paint industry and do you have a machine that you especially focus on promoting at the fairs?
Apart from our Dispersion and other Wet Grinding Machines, one of our 2 products that attract a lot of attention in the exhibitions is Powermill - Convecta and the other is Powermill - Performa.
Powermill Convecta is the most modern and advanced model of the Conventional Horizontal Type Bead Mill / Wet Grinding machines that Yokeş Makina has been manufacturing for more than 25 years.
It is categorized as “High Flow Bead Mill”. Thanks to the strong structure of the agitator disks and the specially designed separation system, very high flow and crushing speeds can be easily achieved.
With the appropriate grinding chamber geometry and parameters, the Wet Grinding Machine operates at a very high efficiency rate.
Powermill Performa is a new generation machine designed to achieve higher capacity, faster wet grinding and higher fineness values in a short time compared to standard horizontal wet grinding machines.
Due to the possibility of using very small crushing / grinding beads, very high crushing speeds can be achieved, and thanks to the small amount of beads used during the process,
it can be operated with lower energy consumption.
Courtesy of its special design, with its small grinding chamber volume and low amount of beads, more than the wet grinding results obtained by conventional Bead Mills with large volume and large amount of beads can be obtained in a shorter time.
The general usage areas of these two machines are the production of all paint and
its by-products, the production of Flexo and Rotogravure Printing Inks, the production of water and solvent based Inkjet Inks, and the production for the agrochemical sector.
What points do you pay attention to in the manufacturing processes of your machines?
Quality is indispensable. One of the most well-known features of Yokes is manufacturing long-lasting, stable and efficient machines.
This is due to the fact that we prioritize quality and precision in our workmanship as well as the materials we use. Of course, we also follow the latest technologies in production and plan our machine and machine investments accordingly.
Even though our machines have a standardized structure, we address different sectors and different productions. In fact, every machine is tailor-made.
Thus, we are able to offer the most accurate solutions to the changing needs of each sector. We define this as flexibility in production. We are in the age of technology and there is a new development every day. Today, 5G and automation technologies attract particular attention.
How do you work to keep up with these developing technologies?
We are a company that is very familiar with Industry 4.0 building blocks and IoT components. As I mentioned before, we choose the machines and benches we use in our own production from the latest technology products, and we pay attention to the fact that the machines we produce are Industry 4 compatible.
Hence, key areas such as product continuity with zero defects, system monitoring and rapid detection of possible malfunctions, increasing flexibility, using less energy, minimizing
heat generation and increasing efficiency in production are always our priority.
We know that you also continue your activities abroad. In this sense, which regions do you mainly sell abroad and do you have any international targets for the coming period?
We are a company that exports 70% of its production. We have established our dealership activities in many countries. We have a sales and service network in Eastern and Central European Countries and Eurasian Union Countries.
We already have brand awareness and are active in the Middle East and African markets. Although we already have a market share in Western Europe, our current goal is to increase our activities in these regions.
For this reason, we participate in international exhibitions and carry out our efforts to expand our dealer and technical service network in these regions.
Apart from sales, what are the services you offer to your customers, can you tell us about your “trial productions” service in detail?
In the Test and Pilot Production facility that we have setup within our factory, we enable both our machines and our customers’ formulations to be tested, and we can also provide a pilot production facility service where dispersion and wet grinding processes can be carried
out with a production capacity of 1 to 2 tons per day when necessary.
How do you evaluate the development of the coatings industry in Turkey and what do you think we need to focus on for sectoral development in these economic conditions in the world?
Due to inflation and post-pandemic supply chain concerns, the paints and coatings market is expected to have fluctuating growth trends in the long term and is expected to continue through 2023.
Geopolitical tensions such as the Ukraine War, natural disasters such as the recent earthquake in Turkey, changes in environmental policy, fluctuations in raw material costs and economic factors have played a significant role both domestically and globally.
We anticipate that the paints and coatings industry will focus on acquiring new technologies, securing raw materials, optimizing the supply chain, strengthening product portfolios and developing capabilities to sustain growth in these challenging times.
However, we remain optimistic that the industry will regain its pre-pandemic performance
as we expect the market to shift its focus and spending habits towards rebuilding and renovations. We estimate that the global turnover of the paints and coatings industry will increase by 80 percent by 2031.
