The Megatitan story, “from the woods to out of the woods”

The experience of a Romanian manufacturer...

Dear reader, you may be reading these lines at work, in your coffee break, in your car or while waiting at the procurement head’s door to show them your company’s new promotion. You are maybe a student and found the magazine at your faculty, or you are going to retire and you feel like you failed to use your professional skills to their entire potential. Maybe you are a happy man and own a successful company...

I wrote my story with a true desire to encourage you to see the “waves”. For anyone reading this, I have great news for you: there is a new wave coming! A large one. European funds worth of 43 billion Euro. What are you going to do with this wave? Will you “ride” it? Will carry you to the shore of prosperity, sink you, or will you stay on the side, watching other “surfers” having the time of their life?

It is true that accessing funds requires certain strictness. It is true they verify you over and over again. But it’s possible! You can even do it without paying “inducement”, or without “knowing a guy”. We did not know anyone and never paid anyone one cent. I remind this to encourage anyone willing to develop their business with European money, because it’s worth it and it’s possible.

Our story

In its 14 years of experience on the Romanian market, Megatitan went through several stages.

In 2011, we timidly began selling splintering tools which we imported from Hungary. Then, we imported cleaning equipment at the same time when construction and installation equipment started entering the Romanian market. In 2000, a Hungarian friend told me for the first time about laser cutting machines. He had recently returned from a Hungarian fair and he was so excited that I say it loudly without blinking: “if everything is like you say it is, I am going buy myself one some day”. Hearing me and knowing my financial situation, he burst into laughing: “Nelu, such a machine is more than a million Deutsche marks””, “Doesn't matter”, I replied without thinking what a million Deutsche marks look like.

We chose Megatitan for their seriousness, flexibility, and for understanding very well our quality needs.

Daniel Borota, CEO Flexibil Baia Mare

Years went by, and when the construction materials market was at its peak, I called my Hungarian friend and reminded him of my dream to have a laser. My business was pretty good, but no way was I in the position to invest that much. My chance had a name, European grants. I had the opportunity to work with Romcom, an Oradea based Romanian-Swiss company, for which I have an utmost respect and which I strongly recommended to all my friends. With the help of Romcom, I wrote a project for the POSCCE program, submitted it and eagerly waited for the answer.

It was 16th of December, 2008. With Bucharest filled with snow, we were invited to sign the grant contract. A lady manager from the Ministry congratulated us for our courage to write projects, gently admonishing us that only 14% of the Romania-allocated funds were absorbed, because that exactly that many projects were submitted. (This gentle admonishing reminded me of one pastor in my youth, who always reprimanded those present because not enough people came at the church).

An here we are with an approved project. We only needed the money to fund the first stages. With the file in my hand, I started looking for solutions at several Romanian banks. Though many banks displayed large billboards claiming their readiness to fund European-funded projects, none was willing to found our project. So we had to borrow from an external lender.

I say all this to encourage you not to give up in spite of obstacles that may seem insurmountable.

And so we purchased our first laser cutting machine, exactly when the market was getting ready for contracting, and what remained was divided between large supermarket chains. Those were trying times for us. The recession in the construction materials business hit hard. We had little prospects to stay in the business. Thus, with the advice of Professor of Mitraş Dudaşof  Cluj and the experience gathered in 10 years of business, I chose a new direction: I became an industrialist.

They have been a committed partner from the very beginning, able to solve our requirements, we never had any quality issues or they have been resolved immediately. We also appreciate the human side of our cooperation, the very good interpersonal relations that we have. We believe that such qualities are vital in today’s business world and wish all the success to this company.

Szőcs Karol, S.C. CAROL TECH SRL Manager

We embarked on a new road, in unknown territory, where competition is high, and also are price pressures and quality and deadline requirements. We started the laser cutting business with only one customer: the Flexibil Company of Baia Mare. With their characteristic professionalism and diligence, they tactfully and patiently taught us how to become professionals in our line of work. The fact that we are suppliers to top companies in the automotive and railway field in many countries is largely due to the Flexibil Company.

Why work with Megatitan

Today, we have a team of young engineers, we serve approximately 200 customers in various lines of work. We do it with the passion and responsibility of a surgeon each and every time. Being aware that the human factor makes or breaks a company, we carefully select our team members and provide them with a pleasant working and development environment, and at the same time instilling respect for the customer as a company policy. This is what customers appreciate too, this is why we are their first choice when they require laser cutting and bending services.

After the first cooperation with Megatitan, I realized the company is into satisfying customer needs by the quality of its products and timely delivery. This company evolved tremendously and I believe it will keep down this road. They have vision, which will continue to be successful. A big part of this company is its team, which in my opinion has learned what it takes to succeed.

Radu Potra, IPROEB

We carefully select both our machine and raw materials suppliers. Thus, we purchased state of the art Trumpf machinery and we are thrilled by their reliability and the maintenance services provided by the Ingmar Company. We want each delivery to be a success and we do everything in our power to achieve it. This year, we began implementing the Lean manufacturing system with the help of a specialist – this is currently the most efficient organization management tool – concurrently with the use of manufacturing monitoring and management software. We are permanently improving the manufacturing processes and delivery services to increase our chances to remain best choice for our customers.

They have been a committed partner from the very beginning, able to solve our requirements, we never had any quality issues or they have been resolved immediately. We also appreciate the human side of our cooperation, the very good interpersonal relations that we have. We believe that such qualities are vital in today’s business world and wish all the success to this company.

Szőcs Karol, S.C. CAROL TECH SRL Manager

We provided services to customers in Dubai, Brazi, Hungary, Germany, Italy, France, Denmark, and many other companies in Romania. Some of them asked us to also provide services such as bending and welding besides laser cutting. This is how we purchased a digitally controlled bending machine and controlled environment welding machines.

We are now able to provide laser cutting services with two Trumpf TruLaser 3030 machines, bending with abkant Trumpf TruBend 5130, punching on Trumpf TruPunch 3000, automatic panel bending on Salvagnini P2 Lean, CNC plate rolling on Roccia HR4W, WIG and MIG welding.

When you have bending and laser cutting work to do, I am here to help.

Nelu Bălan, Megatitan Managing Partner