Maintaining a positive outlook on the future

Sales Report 2024: Thomas Thörewik

They say every cloud has a silver lining. The past year continued on the path of economic downturn we saw signs of already in 2023. But the upside to this has been the time and resources we have been able to dedicate towards building our overall competitiveness and positioning ourselves well for the inevitable upturn ahead. In the hour of darkness, the future looks brighter than ever for iLOQ.

Spreading the burden of success

The recession in our Nordic home markets – especially in the residential construction and renovation sectors – continues to easily overshadow the great progress achieved elsewhere. While we are starting to receive some encouraging signs of recovery from the Finnish market, with Sweden hopefully to follow suit, the past year has shown Central and Western Europe continue on a path of good growth momentum.

We have been able to continue growing in many markets despite similar market challenges. For example, we’ve seen Germany deliver some great results this year in the midst of all these challenging world events and market trends, helping take some of the pressure away from the traditional stronghold markets that have been struggling.

It’s a different world out there

As we continue to expand internationally, we are constantly reminded of how different the world is depending on where you look at it from. From the technological point of view alone, we see that mobile access sharing and management is still considered a novelty or gimmick across much of Europe, while it is already a part of normal everyday life in much of America. This is why R&D efforts were needed to meet market demands in North America while simultaneously being able to enter the market as the first battery-free self-powered solution to offer keyless mobile access solutions in multifamily housing.

Much of 2024 was spent in building up the backend capabilities to serve a large North American market smoothly and locally. Navigating the complexities and potential risks related to political decision-making, and being mindful of the possible implications an all-out tariff war could mean for a European business in the States, we have set up our local US company to work independently. We have established our own warehouse, assembly and logistics center shipping US orders straight out of Dallas, Texas, and invested in developing our offering to meet the technical- and user experience-related expectations of the market.

“As we continue to expand
internationally, we are constantly
reminded of how different the
world is depending on where you
look at it from.”

Opportunities in every direction

While we have been speaking a lot about our expansion west, it is not the only direction we have set our sights on. During the past year, we have continued to expand eastwards as well. We started operations in Australia a little over a year ago. Taking on such a vast territory requires planning and smart decision-making. We have made sure our Australian oval product development has been carried out diligently while simultaneously taking a strategic and structured approach to building a comprehensive partner network down under. With several large orders already from the critical infrastructure segment and a lengthy pipeline of potential new projects and partners, we are already seeing that Australia holds a lot of promise for iLOQ.

Also, less than a year ago we made the decision to establish a presence in Southeast Asia by setting up shop in Singapore. In this short time, we have been able to recruit a local team and start building a partner network. Again, obtaining all local and regional certifications for all relevant technologies has been a part of the process. We’ve been extremely happy to see the first sales coming in already with a healthy pipeline for next year as well. It will take time and resources to establish a strong presence and brand recognition in these new markets, but we have taken several important steps in the right direction on the Eastern frontier as well.

Becoming global means having a global presence

The past few years have shown us exactly what it takes to become a truly global player. With operations now spanning across almost all time zones, in both directions, we see that it is not just impractical, but virtually impossible to run a centralized business from our remote Finnish HQ. Especially where, in the East, they simply can’t wait a full business day for decisions while we in Europe get in our beauty sleep, it is important to start building the capabilities and competences needed for local and regional decision-making independent of our HQ functions.

This expansion has given rise to the development and restructuring of our organization. We have now started on a path of building regional competences and independence with many of the previously centralized functions becoming increasingly independent across the different geographies. As the responsibility is spread further across our organization, we have found it important to ensure that our management is held to an equal and high standard throughout as well. Leadership training has been an important part of this growth and development journey.

While we can’t claim to be happy with where we are in terms of sales, we need to be proud of where we stand today as a company. We are better positioned to take over the world once the markets are revived than we have ever been before. We are eagerly awaiting the future and setting ourselves up for more big wins.