"Sometimes I jokingly say that the 25 years we've been in existence should be multiplied by at least three, considering what we went through in that period," says Željko Tomić in an interview with "Vreme" on the occasion of marking a quarter of a century of the company's business "OSA Computational Engineering". "Since the beginning, since 1989, we have survived various countries and systems, hyperinflation, wars, economic sanctions and all the time we managed to do what we decided to do - we did not deviate from that path and we did not do some other things on the domestic market for survival. We did them in other markets at a time when nothing could be done here," says Tomić, the general director of this company.
"WEATHER": What markets were those??
ZELJKO TOMIC: During the time of economic sanctions, we developed information systems for five airports in Siberia. These were jobs for big players, and we could jump into that story as a way to survive because Russia was not yet so open to the West - we still had some special status. We adapted quickly and were able to develop the software they needed, and that helped us survive.
What were you doing here?, in the country?
Our core business is the distribution of Autodesk computer-aided design software, so-called CAD, in all engineering fields. That was our job even then, but at that time, when the salary was ten marks, it was completely ridiculous to tell someone that the software costs 3000 marks. So we looked for alternatives. Apart from Russia, we also had a lot of business in Cyprus. We had a registered company there, but not like off shore companies that mainly serve for washing and draining steam, rather on shore a company that dealt with visualization in architecture, which was revolutionary at the time. In that period, we in the country started developing software for document management, called Unidocs. We also did symbolic sales of Autodesk software and peripheral devices, plotters at that time, but all that was not enough to develop the company, we had to look for alternatives outside the country.
What are the current problems on the domestic market?
Everyone is talking about the world economic crisis - it is still on the stage and I am afraid that it will appear again in a new form, but this cannot be an excuse for normal business. We are constantly living in some crises - we have domestic, global and all possible economic crises. The problem is that in Serbia, in the area we deal with, the biggest consumers should be the state, state institutions and public companies, however, you yourself know what the situation is in that area - there is no money anywhere.
Is the problem lack of money?, or something else? Although the budget is tight, I do not believe that these are large sums from the point of view of the budget.
And they are not and they are. When there is none, and when it leaks everywhere, then everything is problematic. If we talk about it, the information technology (IT) industry in Serbia has proven to be extremely capable and tough. In the pre-election campaign, she filled newspapers as one of the three pillars of Serbia's economic development and export potential. If you remember, the first minister Ljajić stated in 2012 that our revenue from exporting software was higher than the revenue from exporting raspberries. However, no one talks about information technology anymore. My company is a member of the American Chamber of Commerce, within which we have an ICT committee that tries to create conditions in the environment for better development of that industry. We had meetings with the Ministry of Trade and Telecommunications, electronic administration has now been moved to the Ministry of State Administration, and everyone is willing to cooperate, there is goodwill and awareness of the need to invest in IT. Of course, we live from it, so it is important to me that products and services from that industry are bought and that it grows. But, regardless of that, it has been clearly shown that the level of overall economic development of each country directly and proportionally depends on investment in IT. So, it is not a question of whether we as a country will be modern, modernize some services, but it is a question of whether we will find a way to get a faster connection with other countries in economic development. It doesn't work without it, it can't be done without it.
If there is goodwill, if there is awareness and knowledge of direct IT related progress jem, What is missing then??
First, awareness is not yet sufficiently built at all levels, and what is certainly missing is money. On average, Serbia invests ten times less in IT than the EU average. When you take and look at the level of investment and the level of economic development by country, it is clear to you what we are talking about.
The country has a big problem with the gray economy. And in your business it is one of the biggest problems. In the 1990s, literally nobody paid anything, all the software was illegal, what has changed in the last 10 15 years?
In our country, according to the latest published BSA statistics, the degree of software piracy is between 65 and 70 percent. Of course, this is a large rate, and if it were to be reduced by five percent, it would represent a significant success and a significant increase in state income and the number of employees in the IT industry. We have been fighting for the respect of intellectual property rights and the fight against piracy for all these 25 years. When looking at the formal and legal aspect, many advances have been made - we have a solid law, there are established centers for the fight against piracy in various institutions. However, I have the impression that the problem is in the implementation of the adopted measures and the good will to implement it all, and this is not an exception, but is present in many other areas as well. We have to understand that we are cutting the branch we are sitting on, since the time of the late Tijanic and his famous sentence about Robin Hood. With us you can find software that is still in beta version and has not started to be sold. A major role in the fight against piracy is also played by the tax inspectorate, which, as part of its regular activities, has the authority to monitor software licenses. What should be insisted on, which was adopted, but there is still a problem of application, is showing the license of the participant in public procurement - the license of the software with which he created the necessary documentation.
We mentioned the crisis.. Your business results, by APR u, they work very well. Is it possible to expand business and invest in times of crisis??
It is. Before 2008, we as a company opted for a policy that was strange to people - we never took out loans. We thought that we should expand naturally, to set aside for investments as much as we earn. It was strange to everyone, they told us that we had favorable loans, that no one invests from their own money, they called us from the banks... When the crisis hit, it turned out that it was good that we didn't do that. In the first ten years, none of the founders took a dinar for themselves, everything went into reinvestment. Our results on the APR are extremely good, we have recorded constant growth in the last five years in crisis conditions. Now, it's not because we were that good, that is, we became more and more efficient and recorded better and better results in the same market - a large part of that growth was made possible by the physical growth of the market. Three years ago, Autodesk decided to choose one distributor for the entire area of the former Yugoslavia, plus Albania - the so-called Adriatic region. We applied for that job and got that entire territory. This enabled additional growth, but also additional investments, since Autodesk insisted that we open two more companies, in Zagreb and Ljubljana. When we started working in the Adriatic region, some companies from Slovenia for some reason did not want to do business with us, with a company from Serbia. There is a strong anti-monopoly law in the EU, which means that we as distributors have the Adriatic region in our contract, however, our business partners in Slovenia and Croatia can buy from any EU distributor. In order to prevent new partner departures, we have reduced our earnings as much as possible. Then the others heard that, and now we work with companies from Slovakia, Austria, Poland, Spain, because through our company in Croatia we can work with partners from all over Europe.
What are you planning for the next five years??
I would be very happy if business conditions in our country would stabilize - first of all politically and economically. In the last year, we lost half a year to the elections - when the elections are held, no one does anything, everyone waits to see what will happen. Like all these 25 years, we are not asking for anything special from the state. The most that the state can give us is predictable economic conditions and work rules - whatever they are, as long as they can be predicted and you can plan your business in a certain period. However, the most important thing, what has been the motto of our company since the very beginning, is that the work is done by people. Regardless of the fact that we are engaged in a high-tech business, where technology is very important, if you have good employees, if you manage to motivate them, to raise the synergy a little, so that they feel that it is theirs, then you have done a real job. And that's something we've been doing intensively for 25 years, it's an endless story, and that's the beauty of it all - this is the third year in which our employees participate in profit sharing. We made a survey about what would be the biggest motivation for them to achieve even better results, and they said it - we make the final account in March and set goals for the next year, which are defined in total revenue and net profit. If we throw in that goal, 20 percent of the realized profit is theirs. And it's amazing how much of a motive it is, and how much it means to people.
