We Are Preparing For The Future By Today!

08.06.2020News From Ford

Güven Özyurt Ford Otosan Lideri

The findings of the research carried out by the Advanced Manufacturing and Production unit of World Economic Forum (WEF) among the high-level officials from 30 community members of Asia, Europe, and America including us and over 400 sub-industrial companies enabled us to make important implications for our future.

As you know, we are experiencing a major worldwide epidemic with unprecedented effects, and this pandemic not only affected our health but also affected our lives, from our daily routines to our lifestyles, from our habits to our perspectives by the obscurities and the uncertainties it has caused and brought us to the brink of great change.

This study, in which the WFE assesses the reflections of these effects and changes in the production, manufacturing, and supply processes that we will see permanently, also an important guide for us in the context of resilience. I would like to evaluate the prominent action plans and strategies of this study that you can reach the full text via WEF's social media accounts and its web site and share my opinion with you.

Of course, the most important topic that we encounter, and which needs to be addressed urgently is to protect employees and ensure business continuity. As suggested in the report, we also take measures with proactive moves at Ford Otosan to protect our colleagues, ensure supply security, reduce financial impacts, and direct our actions in a market where uncertainty continues as demand decreases. We are developing different perspectives to support not only our colleagues but also our suppliers and ensure continuity. While doing all these things in a quick way, we also implement projects that we will contribute to society. In this context, we can cite the face shields, Aerosol Boxes, and overalls that we produce together with our suppliers and service providers and distribute them to the hospitals in need.

The topic of the report on recovery and increasing resistance, which is mentioned as the initiatives that need to be accelerated, is focused on the effects of the pandemic to the worldwide companies and preparing for the post-pandemic scenarios. In this regard, we give priority to human health in all “normalization” processes that we have realized and will be realized in this process with our colleagues, suppliers, and stakeholders. I would like to state that the prioritized works of our volunteer teams and the projects that have emerged in Fikirhane are in this direction.

After health-related actions, of course, we must quickly adapt the operation processes of the works to our new normal. Investments in advanced production technologies play a major role in responding quickly to any kind of crisis. As Ford Otosan, we also have experienced the contribution of speeding up our digitization processes and our smart factories at the utmost level on the road to our vision right after the start of the pandemic in our country. Halting the production for a while did not completely disrupt our business and working lives; we have utilized this process by developing and producing medical products with different achievements, and thanks to the digitization steps we have prepared beforehand, we were able to manage all our processes from home. Adapting our business models to allow a more flexible and decentralized structure as recommended in the report by establishing risk management with this experience of ours will provide a great contribution to us in the following normalization processes that we are going to get through.

Again, in these processes, we realized that it is possible to create new business lines with cross-sectoral cooperation models, as well as the opportunity to redefine our external relations. In this regard, during this process, we all have seen the signals of our innovation strategy which is among the most important steps of our vision of becoming the most valuable and preferred industrial company of Turkey transforming into a much stronger muscle.

Even though it is too early to talk about the long-term effects of this pandemic, the lifestyles -that are predicted to change- give some hints to us, the manufacturers. When we evaluate at an industry-specific level, it is already possible to talk about the importance of technological development and innovation in the following days. There will be some industrial companies that will begin to respond to the adaptation suggestion of the report. But since we have long ago begun to use technological development and innovation in our production and supply systems, we anticipate that we will face the long-term effects of a crisis such as the pandemic on a minimum level and that we have the experience and ability to maneuver which would take faster action in the adaptation processes.

We are making all the preparations necessary to adapt to any scenario that awaits us in the future by now. I would like to thank all our colleagues, stakeholders, collaborators, and suppliers who supported us with their existence and efforts in this process and wish you healthy days.