As Ligna is approaching, we met Giancarlo Selci, Biesse founder and one of the few “woodworking machinery people” who needs no introduction…
…and we talked about many things, not to say everything, but very little about Ligna. Well, actually, many things that Mr. Giancarlo Selci told us are related to machines, technology, decisions that will characterize Biesse’s participation in Ligna 2015.
On his desk, page 200 of the catalog of the first Interbimall, back in 1968. Selci looks at the pictures of “Dani 1” and “Dani 2”, automatic routers to process cabinet doors. And he explains how they worked. That was the first success of Costruzioni meccaniche Giancarlo Selci, based in via Montenevoso in Pesaro. We get a glimpse of the photocopy of his employment card, his birth date, January 2, 1936, the line “son of Antonio and Gigina Renzi”… We risk to be overwhelmed by memories, talking about his job as turner at Benelli when he had just become 15, the decision to start his own business few years later, to create Biesse: but then we would have to write a book, and this is not our purpose now.
Selci has left a meeting to talk with us and he makes it clear that he would like to go back as soon as possible, “…because there are a few things to settle”. So we put the recorder on. Off we go!
Mr. Selci, next year you’ll be eighty…
“…and I still have so much to do”, he answers with a surprised tone. “That’s my attitude, I have to carry on, act… Today it’s more difficult, because Biesse is much bigger than in the past:there are many engineering departments, and for someone like me, who likes to see drawings, visit the workshop, live in the factory, it is more challenging.Especially when you get older!!!!
I love my company, probably even more in these hard years.When I decided to prove myself again, all I cared about was Biesse and the three thousand families that depend on it.So I decided to come back and lend a hand, to do what I could with my experience.I took the responsibility to sit back at the steering wheel, though I knew it would be tough… but it has worked.We have worked well and we were probably the first to see a turning point, to understand that we were on the right way… but after all we expected it…”.
Expect? What do you mean?
“The conditions were there, because we continued to invest also in those years.We had the resources and we used them properly.It may sound obvious, but in hard times you have to use your brains, be very careful, look beyond the tip of your nose, avoid harmful decisions, work to improve things, not to make them worse.Each day we had, and still have, many decisions to make, often painful, and each day we had to choose what was right and what should be avoided.
This is your duty when you manage a company.An entrepreneur must read the signs, understand that you cannot go on producing as if nothing had happened.Instead, many companies chose to keep filling up their warehouses, believing that the situation would go back to normal.I repeat, years of tough decisions:cutting production, applying for redundancy funds, considering sales and not turnover, forgetting equipment parked in some place… at the end of 2007 Biesse had closed with a positive result and significant profits, but we had noticed a reduction of orders and we realized that we had to reduce product launches in 2008, make a pessimistic budget, get ready to manufacture anything that was ordered, and nothing else… and then everyone knows what happened…”.
…but you always focused on innovation…
“…because innovation is the greatest value a company can and must express!”, Selci states. “Ideas always work and a good products sells by itself:you almost don’t need sales or marketing.In 1980 I created a machine.It was called “Techno”, an inline drilling machine we presented at Interbimall.In five days I build the sales network in Europe, because everyone came and asked to sell it!It was a big deal, really big, and we sold many machines during the exhibition, because every reseller wanted to have one or two for their showroom!In three months we produced about fifty machines per month, and we are still selling about one hundred every year.And it’s a machine we invented in 1980, thirty-five years ago!”.
Mr. Selci, what were your best ideas, the invention you like to remember?
“There are many, and maybe – I can admit it now – I was not able to leverage them as I should.I tell you why.In the early days of Biesse, power spindles were only made of cast iron, they were heavy and machined on lathes. At a certain point, I had the idea to build them from extruded aluminum: you cut it to the required length, milled the stator seat, a few holes and not much else… not to mention light weight.Unfortunately, I did not patent it.I made the same mistake when I was the first to consider using the same extrusion process for machine worktables.Also in this case, I did not consider protecting my idea with a patent.And again,I invented the head with independent spindles, no patents also in that case.We were the first to install racks instead of ball screws… I underestimated the value of that concept, because we had so many ideas… today patents are registered even for paper sheets and for every new concept you need weeks to understand what can be done and what must be avoided.It seems that today innovation is a job for lawyers and specialists that live in patent offices!”.
In recent years, we see fewer and fewer inventions, and often coming from foreign manufacturers. Don’t you think that new generations have lost inventiveness?
“In other countries there are excellent education and training centers we don’t have, famous universities for mechanical engineering and wood.Our country does not offer much to companies, quite the contrary… We struggle to invest, to obtain construction permits for new factories, and employing an engineer costs more and more.You have no idea how many more engineers we would like to hire for our research and development operations…
Maybe the first generation had more ingenuity, but those were different times, there were different conditions.Today we are focused on finance and we cannot concentrate on new solutions, on prototypes, assembling and dismantling them until you identify the smartest solution”.
And passion cools down…
“Never!Without passion, I would stay in bed every morning!Sure, emotions are gradually quenched by age, but I am still willing to do and no one can take away my enthusiasm.That’s not the critical point:today, I repeat, we have to deal with much more complex organizations that require effective and efficient management.But people must talk more, communicate directly, be more curious about the work of a colleague in the office next door, go and see in person, ask, get information, share.We cannot just send e-mails.We have to talk…
It is not easy to preserve your passion in a country where hundreds of companies close down every day.Something is wrong, something is preventing us to move on.We cannot hang up our hat, but we cannot either work like packhorses and risk failure because the public administration has excessive demands…”.
Was it easier in via Montenevoso?
“There was enthusiasm for a world that ran fast.Today are we going forward or back?We have to face the challenge of globalization, a real problem for small companies that have always been the core of “made in Italy” and now need to reflect, to find a different organization.But not everyone has the attitude or the capacity to do it.We cannot deny that many wonderful products have disappeared; a certain kind of know-how no longer exists or it has turned into an art for few who can afford it.
I do not want to be misunderstood:high tech has brought great benefits, everyone can have more, but today success lies in big volumes, rewarding those who can make 300 identical kitchen sets every day and take over the market.Maybe we are losing some sense of beauty”.
And Biesse? Where are you going in the future?
“We will always do our job, better and better.We will increasingly focus on big plants for high productivity, in view of the globalization we were mentioning before. We are working to turn working centers into tools that enable handicraft businesses to create beauty more easily, to do more and better.
We want to strengthen our activity in all global markets, with the same capacity to promote innovation, as we have done in recent years with software, helping anyone control and operate our machines very easily.Today we sell Biesse machines not only because they are good, but because they have an interface to program and operate them much more easily”.
What’s left to be done at Biesse?
“I will tell you what I would really like to do:start over from scratch!Have 50 hectares and build an even smarter, totally new big factory, where each stage is the best possible.Today the highest costs are represented by logistics, inefficiency, factories that have been developed and expanded over time to meet new requirements.I would really like to start over… we could produce with the same quality at lower costs.All mechanical operations in one place, assembling in another; shuttles that connect each department according to well-planned production logic, in compliance with the lean production methods we introduced several years ago, to minimize waste and to produce more and better.
And then we might talk only about research and innovation, possibly with a dozen new engineers employed to develop all the ideas we have in mind…”.
Come on, Mr. Selci. Do you want to restart history?
“Our job is to help those who choose Biesse think about the future.We have to do the same.Even before them.We have done a lot, but we still have a lot to do…”
…and what are you doing here in your office?
“That’s my life.Biesse is my home.I have a small boat, a house in the hills where I cultivate some vegetables, tomatoes… but in the evening I leave the office at seven.Time is tight.A bit of television and then I go to bed, thinking about many things that await me on the next day…”.
Well done, Mr. Selci. It’s a bit late to change such good habits. And what for, then? Thank you for your time and see you soon!
by Luca Rossetti
Interview with Giancarlo Selci, Biesse founder
ultima modifica: 2015-04-30T00:00:00+00:00
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