Innovation and technology ecosystem
In October 2021, the number of establishments in the manufacturing sector in Mexico exceeded 606,000. By 2022, the industry plans to invest US$3.5 billion in technology, according to data from the Association of Manufacturing Technology (AMT).
According to César Castro, former president of Index Occidental and current coordinator of the Council of Chambers of Jalisco, 77% of Jalisco's manufacturing exports go to the United States and Canada.
Jalisco's pharmaceutical sector is one of the most representative at the national level. In this context, the company led by Ignacio Luna stands out: Biofarma Natural CMD. In addition to being 100% Mexican, it is the only company in the sector that combines research, formulation, production, and commercialization of medicines, herbal remedies and food supplements. The company has 700 employees and efficiently operates five business units: its own brands for small pharmacies; retail brand; private label; manufactures for third parties -which accounts for 50% of its activities-, as well as a partnership with a multilevel company.
Another company in the sector is Exim. With 800 employees, it is a conglomerate of Mexican companies with a presence in international markets. Exim has expanded its activities to the automotive, chemical and biotechnology sectors, among others.
Exim's history began with Ciosa Autopartes, founded in 1988 by
Jaime Huguenín Planter. The company developed and generated new businesses.
“It all started with my father's idea to take advantage of the then new opportunity to import products from Asia to Mexico, specifically products for the automotive aftermarket industry. Over time, we invested in other organizations, for example, in the chemical industry with Biozone, a company focused on the manufacture and development of environmentally friendly cleaning and disinfection products. We also participate in the agro-biotechnology industry with
Altus Biopharm, where we produce agricultural inputs from microorganisms; this contributes to a more balanced and productive agriculture, a rapidly growing global trend. We also seek to promote innovative business concepts through Cococo, a builder of digital technology projects which disrupt conventional business models. Finally, convinced that consumers will increasingly seek to live experiences rather than consume products, we have ventured into the restaurant industry with a multistore fast food proposal; in Chirimbola we seek to elevate the usual experience of enjoying a hamburger to another level,” states
Manufacturing and Technology
Jorge Huguenín Bolaños Cacho, president of Exim.
Jorge Huguenín indicates that COVID-19, regardless of the degree of impact, taught impressive lessons to all industries. Exim was no exception; its consolidated result in 2021 was substantially better than that obtained in 2019. In the wake of the pandemic, a mindset shift emerged in the group regarding what they must do to become not only participants in different industries, but potential transformers of those industries. The result is a change in focus towards innovation and the constant quest to challenge the status quo.
Exim is committed to promoting Mexican talent and maximizing its potential. “Our vision is to double the size of the group in a maximum of five years; we believe we can achieve this in four,” implies Huguenín. Huguenín sees a great opportunity for expansion in the export of new products with low environmental impact technology, which increase agricultural production and quality. It is currently initiating the process of sanitary registration of these products in the United States, so that in a year and a half it will be able to start selling them in that market.
Jorge Huguenín remarks: “The world's large chemical industries are adapting to the new rules. The new global awareness of the food industry aims to eradicate in the short term the damage caused by chemicals in the field.”
Exim is also involved in social projects, one of them called Escultórica Monumental, which donates public sculptures that transform city environments. This project is a collaboration of three parties: the artistic community; the business community, which pays the production cost of each sculpture; and the state government, which in addition to granting permits, facilitates the installation and dissemination. “The idea is to do it in as many municipalities of the country as possible, and to create links with other countries, because there are great Mexican artists whom we can help to expand their horizons,” says Jorge Huguenín.
“Jalisco is standing out in the field of technological-digital solutions, besides being a very welcoming state to make alliances and business,” adds the president of Exim.
Multinational corporations such as Jabil, Flextronix, Sanmina, have set their eyes on Jalisco because of its technological potential.
David Gil Jaca, CEO of IKOR Mexico, also highlights that for IKOR Mexico it is of utmost importance the vibrant professional ecosystem for more than 100,000 people in the electronics companies located in
Biozone is focused on the manufacture and development of environmentally friendly cleaning and disinfection products
the state of Jalisco. “The educational support that Jalisco invests in universities that train great engineers and the prevailing knowledge of all processes related to new technologies, positions Jalisco, as a highly relevant point for the technology sector,” affirms Gil.
IKOR is a company within the technology sector that stands out for its commitment to customer service for the design and manufacture of electronic cards. The company was founded in 1981 in San Sebastián, Spain. However, thanks to internationalization projects, in 1998 it inaugurated its plant in Guadalajara, Mexico, followed by the creation in 2004 of a plant in Suzhou, China.
In 2003, IKOR made a jump into the industrial sector through the refrigeration sector, with the manufacture and design of electronic controls. In 2007, IKOR entered the automotive sector, which currently generates 60% of the company's total sales, achieving its automotive certification in 2009 and, subsequently, in 2014 it achieved its medical certification.
Currently, IKOR Mexico has sales in excess of 50 million euros per year and a workforce of more than 400 employees.
An important part of IKOR's trajectory unfolds in 2015, when the ebm-papst Group, a German company, acquired 51% of the company and completed the full acquisition in 2019. Subsequently, during 2021, Connect Group, a Belgian electronics company with significant presence in Europe, bought 76% of IKOR, leaving 24% belonging to the ebm-papst Group. In view of the success of the internationalization project, the integration of IKOR within Connect Group is an essential point in the growth and prevalence of the company, with estimated sales in 5 years of around 150 million euros.
Also, thanks to this internationalization, IKOR has been able to expand its horizons to the automotive, industrial and medical sectors for the T-MEC market (Mexico, USA, and Canada). 90% of its customers are multinationals distributed in Europe and North America.
Although the U.S. company Plexus began operations in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua in 2000, it achieved its highest growth in the last eight years, since it decided to set up operations in Jalisco. This allows the company to take advantage of all the benefits this state has to offer.
According to their Vice President of Operations for Latin America, José Coelho, they offer a chain of services that includes design, development, manufacturing, product introduction and even Aftermarket Services, to extend the useful life of the products. This has enabled them to increase their customer platform.
And just as multinational companies trust their investments in Jalisco, Mexican companies are also eager to innovate and invest in this state. This is the case of Grupo Evans, which 40 years ago started manufacturing small water pumps and later diversified its offer for specific markets. Recently, Grupo Evans acquired the largest pruning shears factory in the world, according to Jorge Valdez Simancas, president of the group.
Grupo Evans also decided to venture into the water and energy sector, to bring business and household customers practical solutions for their savings and efficiency.
Among its goals are to strengthen what they call “the last mile”, to support distributors with the delivery of products in two hours, to streamline the entire process, and finally, to prioritize its online sales.
Another business from Jalisco that has been in the market for 40 years is Maqpower. This company has positioned itself as one of the market leaders in compressed air systems for industry.
“During these four decades we have been growing. We started our operations in Guadalajara, which has remained our mainstay, but the expansion continued. Today we have eight offices in Mexico (Guadalajara, Puebla, Hermosillo, Durango, Mexicali, Tijuana, Toluca, and León) and one in the United States (Los Angeles, CA),” indicates Alejandro Tamez, CEO of Maqpower.
Currently, the company has more than three decades working with the Sullair brand, which is its flagship brand, although it also has other brands that allow it to meet the requirements of each project.
Tamez says: “At Maqpower we seek to work in the most integral way possible, with values,”, and adds: “I represent the third generation along with my sisters. We had not planned a transition from the second to the third generation that soon. As a result of the opportunity to have an office in the United States, my father went to open the office in Los Angeles. My sister and
I took the reins of the operation in Mexico with a very important challenge.”
Maqpower's Vision for 2025 is to bring the compressed air systems of all its customers to optimum efficiency while strengthening the company's structure.
The company is also looking to expand into Latin America. “We have been developing a new business unit. We are very close to being able to open the doors to Central, South America and the Caribbean,” affirms Tamez.
And betting on the area of information technology, Jalisco has Compusoluciones. This wholesale hardware and intellectual property company has been offering for more than 35 years, comprehensive and cost-effective technology solutions, as well as cloud applications, aimed at ensuring the efficient and complete digital transformation of companies.
Its offering includes products such as Siclick, a resilient e-commerce platform designed to operate even during power and Internet failures; Robotic Process Automation (RPA), to optimize and automate repetitive and massive flows, which can be sales or payments; Data analysis to support its partners with greater certainty; and, Tesselar, an initiative specialized in business management and in promoting the technological development of small and medium-sized enterprises. In addition, with the same purpose of digitizing companies of all sizes, they allied with the Chilean star-up Rocketbot.
According to Ruben Masayi Gonzalez Uyeda, businessman and former Coordinator of the Council of Chambers of Jalisco, today Jalisco creates people whose value is their knowledge, who contribute to companies not only with manual work, but also intelligent work. "It is worth mentioning that the first Secretariat of Innovation in the country was created in Jalisco and that we currently have technological development and maquila centers, which is important," indicates Gonzalez.
A company that is a national reference in innovation and technology is CONTPAQi. This accounting software developer has been offering solutions to streamline processes within companies for more than 35 years.
Today, CONTPAQi is one of the highest rated companies, recognized by The Great Place To Work Institute, which ranked it first among
The knowledge of all processes related to new technologies, positions Jalisco as a high relevant point for the technology sector
the best companies to work for in Mexico. And, for the last ten years, it has remained in the top ranks.
The company has a high acceptance and penetration in the national market, positioning itself as one of the most influential corporations in its field. It currently has close to one million users and six thousand distributors nationwide. In addition, it has a presence in more than a thousand universities and educational centers that offer public accounting courses. “The administrative tools we provide become a learning tool, because what we are interested in is that people understand the concept and then delegate the mechanical part to our software,” states René Martín Torres Fragoso, president and CEO of CONTPAQi.
The company currently has 450 employees and has been growing for the past five years. Sales have been growing by about 10% year over year, with a projected annual sales of about $40 million U.S. dollars, making them one of the largest software development companies.
Micro and small companies made up the 80% of its market, medium-sized companies around 15%, and large companies 5%, the latter not being its target audience.
“I want to make CONTPAQi a human-centric company. In other words, most companies have become dehumanized. Our customers are human beings, not companies. We have segmented them to understand their problems and to be able to offer them solutions, but in the end, behind them there are people, and companies must serve people. The future of humanity is 'Happytalism', making others happy. For example, I make my clients happy with the products and services I offer; I make my employees happy because they develop their God-given gifts and talents and can therefore develop their assets; I make my shareholders happy, I make my suppliers happy, because together with them and my allies, we can also face great challenges that make us all grow,” states Torres.
Regarding future plans, Torres comments that in the coming years they see themselves with a presence in different Latin American countries. “What we are looking for is not to compete in those markets, but to go to the leader of each one of them, so that we can invite them to see what are the meeting points of our companies. Thus, we can have more value together than separately,” indicates the CEO of CONTPAQi.
Another company that has been revolutionizing the sector for almost three decades is ABSA, a company that offers products and services to increase and make more efficient the production processes of companies through automation technologies. In the early years of this business group, manual controls used to be utilized on industrial equipment in Jalisco. “It was necessary to change the mentality of Tapatío businessmen,” explains its CEO, so the company introduced a programmable logic controller called PLC, which
was an industrial computer similar to a black box. This technology made it possible to guarantee greater production with minimum defects, in addition to improving the productive efficiency of the companies. At that time in its history, “we were three or four people at ABSA, today the group has 450 employees,” says engineer Luis Carlos Garza, who adds: “Today we are number one in automation.”
Grupo ABSA began as a family business founded by Mr. César Garza Salazar, who was initially committed to the implementation of automation systems in industrial processes. Today, his son, engineer Luis Carlos Garza Tamez, heads the group.
Established in Guadalajara, Grupo ABSA expanded into the northwest of the country and became involved in the area of networks and telecommunications, a division of the group called Enterprise. Later on, ABSA started the assembly of electrical panels, an operation that includes solutions from the two previous areas: process automation, as well as networks and telecommunications; Panel One Custom is the name of this division.
This is one of the few companies in Mexico with UL certification, necessary to ship electrical products to the United States, in addition to ISO 9000 certification.
ABSA also has an area called Energy, linked to quality and energy savings, and renewable energies. Finally, an interesting phenomenon that is part of the commitment of its CEO is the investment in the so-called Industry 4.0.
“Today, a concept called Industry 4.0 is entering the scene,” says engineer Luis Carlos Garza. He adds that “the concept refers to the fact that we are living in a fourth industrial revolution, that occurs when you connect the manufacturing side of the plant to the Internet.”
In the area of IOT, which stands for “Internet Of Things,” ABSA generates the design of hardware, firmware, mobile applications and web applications, to solve the problems that its customers have on IIOT (Industrial Internet Of Things). “By using information from the manufacturing floor together with very sophisticated algorithms, we can predict whether the result of the product will be of the desired quality, or not.” Garza believes that Industry 4.0 can help make savings, as well as batch predictions, in addition to customizing mass produced products by simulating and predicting product behavior. “Think Big Data, artificial intelligence, neural networks and augmented reality. All that information can be put at the service of the industry,” he
In Mexico, ABSA is the #1 in automation
Think Big Data, artificial intelligence, neural networks and augmented reality. All that information can be put at the service of the industry
says.
Grupo ABSA, through acquisitions, fusions, or alliances with cybersecurity companies, IOT companies and software development companies, aims to generate a complete ecosystem that allows it to offer a differentiated and unique proposal to its customers.