Qualist Technology is a technology company established within Soyak Holding in 2009. Qualist Technology General Manager Gökay Turanlıoğlu calls the company, which he is leading, as “Industry 4.0 Digital Transformation Department of Enterprises”.
Turanlıoğlu says that industrial revolutions brought the change together; “Our goal as Qualist is to be a reliable solution partner for our customers.”
Will you mention about your company?
We started operating in 2009 as a subsidiary of Soyak Holding. In fact, Qualist originated from the requirements of the enterprises within Soyak Holding. Rather than considering that the industry needs such kind of a software we found out what needs the businesses in order to be able to work more efficiently, more productive and more competently and we started from the necessities and requirements of the field. This is our greatest advantage that distinguishes us from other similar solution creating companies.
Will you mention about the story of the Industry 4.0? What are your solutions for your customers about this technological revolution that has been on the agenda nowadays?
The story of Industry 4.0 evolves as follows: We are just beginning to learn how to use machines and equipment in the 1780s. We use them with steam and water energy. 100 years after that, in the 1870s we are beginning to explore the power of electricity. Hence, the huge machines that need to work with steam and water force will become smaller. It is more manageable and does not require to be built nearby the specific resources; it is starting used in more accurate and effective places in terms of logistics. Because that it is more manageable with electricity, we can transform into serial production. Because productivity is increasing now, we can work more easily, we can build more production lines and we are actually starting to learn the principles of production. And time is running and transformation into Industry 3.0 occurs. Industry 3.0 is the management of the business with electricity, electronics. In other words, instead of manual and body power, the work force transforms into the facilities provided by electric motors, robots, automation. We are starting to work more efficiently and more flexibly.
Industry 4.0 is entering our agenda in 2010. Technology becomes smaller and its cost is reducing. And we are beginning to learn how to use this technology.
Industry 3.0 is a hardware revolution. And Industry 4.0 is a software revolution. Let`s exemplify it together: We tell our partners that we are a department of their business. Industry 4.0, your digital transformation and intelligent factory department. So take advantage of this from us. There is an important mission which this brings. Especially when we go to our customer tell this; Industry 4.0 digital conversion does not give the plant just a predictive maintenance capability, in fact, with this capability, the main goal of Industry 4.0 is to make the systems to contact each other with the capabilities we gained here, to do business with the data, to get reports automatically and to facilitate the system. For example, reducing the time between two stops which means physically making the job more efficient. Therewithal it means to be able to get and manage more accurate sources and raw materials in the supply line. Along with this, it means to be able to better adapt to the demands of the customers as the work gets more productive. This means ultimately adding value to the company, which is the mission of ours, the professionals. We are trying to grow our businesses, work more efficiently, be more competitive, effectively create value and to increase the value. So Industry 4.0 is actually a way to increase the value of the company.
Will you give a real example for Industry 4.0?
Let’s talk about two examples. First; a production engineer comes his office every morning at 8 pm and starts working, his job is to prepare the enterprise’s daily business report. How he is doing this; he receive an information from the ERP system, an information from the energy system, an information from the production area, an information from the SCADA system and collects them all at excel, works on it, divides, multiplies and tries to make the daily business report. This is a six-hour lasting effort for an engineer. When we look at these 6 hours, because that we do not use accumulated know-how and expert capacity it is a waste of time for the enterprise. Because the most important means of an enterprise is human resource.
In this enterprise, we started collecting its data with Bridge which is our Industry 4.0 product range. How we collect the data; ultimately, we are a software layer sitting on top of all the machine assets, all the software infrastructure of an enterprise. By combining the data from these various sources, we have a chance to understand from the language of this data, to become a comment part where the enterprise can measure its pulse. And it took half an hour to make the business report with Bridge which was 6 hours effort at the beginning. Thus, at the end of this process, which lasted for half an hour, we saved 5 hours and 30 minutes for the human resource who is the most important value. Thus, this enterprise can evolve into creating intelligence from the knowledge.
A second example is; each machine has its own pulse and a working pattern. There may be periodic deterioration, the system may be overloaded. This potential deterioration, breakdowns and eventual outages may occur. A customer of us had 12 to 15 unplanned, unexpected outages per year. When the business is stop for some reason, this means serious delay in orders, keeping spare parts which means extra cost, and at the same time because we need to take quick action, maybe it will create problems in terms of work safety when these outages occur. Using our Bridge products alarm system they reduced the unplanned outages from 12 or 15 into zero in a year. This means an incredible productivity growth.
What kind of investment are we talking about?
When you scale with the economic benefit it creates, I can say that it is actually cost-efficient. Absolutely it requires an investment process and planning. We even recommend to our customer start with the pilot system and after learning ‘how to benefit from this technology’ the method of spreading it into the whole enterprise. This allows us to manage costs more effectively.
How the Cement sector approaches Industry 4.0? Is the sector ready for transition into Industry 4.0, I think that they also need to be ready as infrastructure…
We see that the enterprises which start the digital transformation into Industry 4.0 gain incredibly additive effect. When we look at the application in the field, it may be necessary for older enterprises to update their infrastructures. They may need to make investments in infrastructures that help to collect their data. Current new established enterprises are incredibly prepared and they will be even more demanding than us.
The transition to Industry 4.0 is essentially a corporate culture transition at the same time. It’s not enough to make that investment.
It is necessary to plan the activity of the enterprise, the operating approach, reporting system and talking about and discussing how will take advantage this new gift as a culture adding value to the weight of enterprise according to its logic. We have to act considering on it.
We know that you serve for a lot of sectors. Which sectors are your priorities especially in 2018?
Among our customers, there are many sectors such as chemical, food, automotive, energy, aluminum, metal sectors as well as the cement sector. We create benefits and added value wherever there are production. As we gain experience, we get the chance to reflect it to our customers. This is an important advantage of us. We have been working in this area since 2009. If we consider that the transition of Industry 4.0 is designated as the year 2010, we are actually started to create this added value in the first phase of the revolution. Therewithal, we are trying to give importance to R&D and trying to be on top of the innovation curve. In this sense it is very important to be an on-site R&D.
On the other site, it is very important for us to have a branch and a R&D company in Technopolis in Switzerland. Therefore, we follow quickly what is happening in the global world and we also have an R&D team that works as a local enterprise understanding, seeing and following the new technology for leading this technology.
What is the biggest difference between you and your competitors?
As a company originated from the requirements of the production field in the industry perpendicular, we are making a significant difference with our experienced team who understand the requirements of and develop studies to solve the problems of the production engineer, maintenance engineer, raw material chief, energy manager and the business manager. As a software company; we do not write both games and e-commerce platforms. We have an expertise: Industrial Intelligent Software Solutions. We are very serious about this and we are investing in this specialty.
You are a 100 % Turkish funded company. Are there any disadvantages of this?
Sometimes yes, but we overcome this disadvantage showing how good is the work we do, how much it adds value and how valuable it is.
Please note that Turkey is a country that can work especially as outsource in the software field. And as an outsource market where good engineers produce valueadded jobs, we have a much better positioned location than India. Therefore, there is a perception in this sense. We are trying to tell you how good is our correctly done job by collating all these things. And we take care to reinforce this by practicing it in the field and writing success stories.
And what kind of revolution the Industry 5.0 do you think will?
We will experience the evolution of transformation into realization awareness with industry 5.0. How we are going to do this; with increased reality solutions. How will we provide this; with tablets, smart glasses. We need to move the minds we managed and produced into the field and we have to manage them correctly on the machines and equipment. Industry 5.0 is the value added period with the collaboration of man and machine.
Did you start working on Industry 5.0?
We started working on it a long time ago and I think we have reached a very important point. At end of our studies we produced an application called Qualist Go. It will be directly downloaded to cell phones and tablets. We receive information from our data collection and analysis software, which we have named as Qualist Bridge, and we move it into the field as Augmented Reality through the Qualist Go application, and we get the chance to communicate with the center point through the Remote Assistance service.
Will you mention about yourself? How many hours a day do you work? How your hobbies add value to your life?
I studied finance and banking in New York. Then I started working on finance and stock marketing in New York. Then I understood how much I love trading. I am a derivative of a genetic derived from 2 grandfathers. One of them was an elementary school teacher and one of the first graduates from village institutes. My academic love comes from him. And the other grandfather was greengrocer. And the trading and producing desire comes from him. I also was lucky in my childhood; I have a technology love coming from my father. My father firstly worked in a technology company and then worked as the IT Operation Director of Turkey’s first and most important GSM operator. So I grew up in the world of technology and I had a close relationship with technology since my childhood.
I came to Turkey after completing my career in America and I worked at Esas Holding which belongs to Sabancı family. I moved to Soyak Holding 7.5 years ago and I worked in different duties inside the group. Since January 2018 I am in duty of General Manager in Qualist.
Of course, the support of my wife, Yıldız, is extremely important in this intense work tempo that this career line brings.
