Noh Jung-deuk, CEO of KEM, explains the advantages of oil skimmer, the main product. Reporter Kang Won-tae

"I will become David who destroys Goliath in the global machine tool market." 

KEM, Gamjeon-dong, Sasang-gu, Busan, a manufacturer of machine tools and electric/electronic parts, is known as the 'strong David' in the global machine tool market. 

Good quality and competitive price Recognized worldwide

Significantly improved design for ease of use

Accumulation of independent technology Accumulation of research and development

Active entry into emerging markets in Europe and East Asia

This is because KEM is increasing its market share based on products developed by itself in the oil skimmer market, where a large American company occupies 80% of the world market. 

The oil skimmer is a machine that purifies environmental pollutants contained in cutting oil generated from various machine tools that process metal. Recently, as interest in environmental preservation has increased worldwide, it has been installed as a major essential part of most machine tools. 

Noh Jung-deuk, CEO of KEM, said, “Until our company exported oil skimmers, large American companies had almost monopolized the oil skimmer market around the world.” Small and medium-sized enterprises, which had been purchasing at high prices, welcomed it and expressed their intention to purchase it,” he said. David threw a gauntlet at Goliath. 

Established in 1988, KEM is playing a pioneering role in the localization of domestic machine tool parts. At the time, domestic machine-related large enterprises and small and medium-sized enterprises were dissatisfied with the use of foreign machine tool parts that were expensive and could not be easily repaired even if they were broken. 

In order to resolve these complaints in the industry, KEM has focused its research and development on localizing various machine tool parts and succeeded in localizing about 10 types of machine tool parts that were produced overseas, such as oil coolers. Based on such technology, KEM has grown into a small but strong company that supplies to large domestic companies such as Doosan Infracore. 

The oil skimmer is a representative flagship product that incorporates KEM's technology, and is recognized in the global market for its high quality and competitive price. 

KEM's oil skimmer is said to have excellent durability by using a metal material called urethane that is resistant to friction between metals and is resistant to various adverse conditions. KEM explains that the quality is never inferior to that of American conglomerate products. 

In particular, KEM has greatly improved the design of the oil skimmer so that users can use it conveniently and easily, and it is receiving a great response in the field. KEM products are durable and user-friendly, but the price is 60-70% of that of large American companies. 

CEO Noh said, “Oil skimmer is not a patented product that only our company produces, but it is not easy for us to localize an overseas product with our own technology and export it to another country.” We put all our efforts into research and development to integrate into products,” he said. 

Since 2008, KEM's oil skimmer has been continuously exported to various countries such as the United States, Malaysia, and Singapore. Recently, emerging markets in Europe, such as Turkey and Poland, are also receiving high attention. 

KEM acquired the 'European Quality Certification (CE)' last year, which was a great help in exporting to Europe, and this year, as it is promoting quality certification in the US and China, exports to overseas markets are expected to increase. 

In the future, KEM plans to focus on R&D on quality improvement and overseas marketing to expand the market for its flagship oil skimmer. 

In the case of KEM oil skimmer, although it has achieved differentiation from other products in the world, KEM's analysis is that it is still lacking by 2% in terms of performance. KEM plans to actively promote its products by participating in exhibitions in those countries in order to advance into emerging markets in Europe and East Asia, such as Turkey, Poland, and Japan, while improving the performance of the oil skimmer by investing R&D expenses every year. 

Representative Noh said, "Japan has been ordering many machine tool parts from domestic companies since the Fukushima nuclear power plant accident. 

Compared to Japanese products, Korean products do not lag behind in quality and are competitive in price.”

“I am confident that our products that have been recognized around the world will work well in Japan. We will focus on entering the Japanese market in the future,” he said.

Reporter Kim Hyung moon@busan.com 

[source] Busan Daily - [The world is our stage] 'KEM', a manufacturer of machine tools and electric/electronic parts

http://www.busan.com/view/busan/view.php?code=20130410000043