Maggie Lin, International Sales Manager at Takam Machinery (USA/China/Taiwan)

Based out of Taiwan, Takam Machinery (AKAM group) manufactures CNC milling machines, vertical machining centers, horizontal machining centers, CNC gantry machining centers, CNC lathes, milling machining center attack drill centers and CNC milling machines for heavy industrial use. Their machinery is used across the aerospace, automotive, electronics, precision molds and mechanical parts processing sectors.

Maggie is the international sales manager for their Chinese global production center – one of three – located in Xiamen, China which covers an area of 30 000 square meters and she was kind enough to give me a bit of time out her busy schedule to help me understand more about their operations. Key takeaways from this interview with Maggie include:

• The Chinese market may be hyper-competitive but the potential is incredible with the proper investment of resources.
• Specialize and grow within a known market before expanding into a new one.

You can find them online at http://www.takam.com/?lan=us.

Thanks for being in this interview Maggie, can you tell me a bit about your background and how you got into the CNC industry in general? Maggie谢谢你这次参加这个访问， 你可以跟我说一下你的背景跟你为什么会踏入数控机械的这个行业吗？

I am a statistic major graduate from the University of California Los Angeles and currently a financial engineering master student at Xiamen University. The main reason why I got into the CNC industry is because of my family. Majority of my family is in the CNC manufacturing and selling industry; I followed my parents’ footsteps into the sales of CNC Machinery also.

我是美国加州大学洛杉矶分校统计学毕业的，目前正在厦门大学攻读金融工程的硕 士学位。 我会踏入机械行业主要的原因是因为我的家人，我大部分的家人都是在数控机床生产及销售的行业， 所以我跟随我父母的脚步也踏入了数控机床销售的这个行业。

Can you give me a bit of history about Takam Machinery and does it serve primarily a domestic or international client base? How large is your factory and how many people work in it? 你可以大致跟我说一下大金机械的历史吗？ 大金机械的销售主要服务国内还是国际客户呢？ 你们的公司有多大，然后有多少员工呢？

Takam machienry is Taiwanese-owned enterprise, there are three global production bases, located in California, USA & Taichung, Taiwan & Xiamen, China. Xiamen. Takam Machinery Co.,Ltd was founded in 1989, located in Xiamen City, China’s special economic zone, covers an area of 30,000 square meters, with about 250 employees.

Engaged in CNC high-tech series product development, manufacturing and sales, TAKAM, MAPLE international high-end CNC machines’ brand has been formed, and widely used in the aerospace, automotive, electronics, precision molds and mechanical parts processing and many other types of industries.

TAKAM products including CNC milling machines, vertical machining centers, horizontal machining centers, CNC gantry machining centers, CNC lathes, milling machining center attack drill centers, CNC milling machines and so on. The products are exported to Germany, Italy, United States, Russia, Thailand, South Africa, Turkey and other countries. In the domestic market covering Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin, Chongqing, Fujian, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong, Shandong, Henan and other provinces and regions in China. TAKAM in line with “the pursuit of quality, create value, quality service” business philosophy, continuously improve the quality of service and innovation, committed to produce the high-quality, high-tech products to meet global customer demand.

大金集团（TAKAM）系台资企业，拥有全球三大生产研发基地，分别位于美国加利福尼亚、台湾台中、中国厦门。 大金机械有限公司成立于1989年，位于中国经济特区厦门市，占地面积30000平方米以及员工人数250名左右，从事数控高科 技系列产品的研发、制造和销售，目前已形成了TAKAM、MAPLE等国际高端数控机床品牌，广泛运用于航空、汽车、电子、精密模具与机械零件加工等行业。

TAKAM生产包括数控铣床、立式加工中心、卧式加工中心、数控龙门加工中心、数控车床、车铣复合加工中心、攻钻中心、数控雕铣机等产品，远销德国、意大利、美国、俄罗斯、泰国、南非、土耳其等国家，在国内覆盖北京、上海、天津、重庆、福建、江苏、浙江、广东、山东、河南等省份和地区。TAKAM本着“追求品
质、创造价值、优质服务”的经营理念，不断提高服务质量与研发创新，致力于制 造出满足全球客户生产需求的高质量、高技术产品。

Takam offers an extensive list of CNC machinery, from primarily vertical to horizontal machine types. Which ones are the most popular with your company and why? 大金机械有很多系列的数控机床，主要有立式加工中心到卧式加工中心。哪种机型是你们公司销售最热门的产品呢？为什么？

From past experience Takam is very well known for its vertical machine centers especially for its TK and M-ONE Series machine. With our new series of TE-Series machines brought out, our sales of vertical machine centers have just kept on rising. The main reasons are due to the performance price ratio that we offer our clients. With the price they pay for our machines, we ensure them the best machine for the price and the best customer service we can offer to each and every one of our clients. Since they are all special individuals for us. We are also very well known for larger machine types too. Our horizontal machine centers and Double column machine centers are also export and sold all over the globe.

从大金机械以前的销售记录来看，大金机械的立式加工中心是非常畅销的一款机型。 特别是我们的TK跟M-ONE系列的立式加工中心。 现在我们新推出了一款TE系列的立式加工中心让我们的销售量再次的冲向新高。 我们分析的主要原因是因为大金机械为所有的用户提供了最高性价比的数控机床。 当用户够买了我们的机床，我们确保用我们最好的售后服务来服务我们每一位的客户，因为每一位客户对我们来说都是独一无二的。 我们在大型机器的部分也是非常成熟的，成功的售出以及出口到世界各地。

What makes Takam stand-out from the competition? Why would a business acquire your tools over that of other providers? 是什么可以使大金机械在众多竞争者中突出？ 为什么客户会选择你们的数控机床而不是别人的呢？

Compare to other competition we are not just a typical CNC manufacture in China. Our business philosophy is to provide the best product for our customers at the best price, therefore we bring all of our major parts from Taiwan to ensure the quality of our materials, with the newest ideas and techniques from Taiwan we can ensure that what we deliver to our clients is something they can rely and be happy with their purchase, and not just another machine bought with many worries.

With our excellent service we provide after sales is also a plus; in many regions in China we provide a 48 hour immediate response for our clients. With faster respond we take care of the problems better for our clients. As for international customers we always make sure the dealers and agents we work with have a well service team so even though we do not sell to many of the direct end users we will also ensure that our agents and dealers provide the best service.

在中国跟别的机械厂商比起来我们不是只是一家普通的数控机床制造商。我们公司的宗旨是给予我们客户最好的价格跟产品， 所以我们从台湾进口所有的主要零部件来确保我们机床的品质，同时从台湾引进最近的构思跟技术。这样我们才可以确保从我们工厂出去的机床是客户可以信赖跟高兴购买的产品，而不是一台他们有许多担心的机床。

同时我们优秀的售后服务团队是一个购买我们机床加分的地方。 在中国很多的城市我们有提供一个48小时之内响应的售后服务团队。 有了更快的售后服务团队我们可以更快的替我们的用户解决他们机床上的小问题。至于国际客户的售后问题，我们都是通过有优秀售后服务团队的经销商来进行协助。所以我们在寻找国际经销商上也是非常严格的，我们必须确保我们的国际经销商有自己的服务团队，这样我们才放心他们会提供我们的国际用户最好的售后服务。

Can you give me an idea of the typical sales process from initial contact to finished  product? What kind of lead times do you need and do you manufacture everything in-house? 你能稍微跟我说一下你们的销售从最初接洽倒交机的步骤吗？ 你们的交货期一般都要多久？ 是否所有的东西都是在工厂里生产？

Our typical sales process is find either end users or dealers/agents. Once we discover that is a possibility of need in CNC machinery we will first understand what our clients needs are and if they can provide us with the photos or drawings of the products they are trying to produce. With our professional engineering team we usually provide the best solution for our clients to best fit their needs.

Once the clients agrees on the same level with us then we start talking about our lead time which typically is about 45 days for most types of the machine unless they are special ordered. One-way to ensure our product quality we manufacture everything in house except for the casting. We machine the casting; make our own casing and paint to ensure the exterior quality of our machine. By producing everything in house, we can better control the quality of our machines and control the delivery time of our machines.

通常我们的销售步骤都是从跟终端用户或者经销商开始沟通。当我们发现客户中有需要购买数控机床，我们会先去了解客户的需求是什么，他们要的东西是什么。如果有可能的话，最好客户都会提供图纸供我们参考。 当有了这些咨询，我们专业的工程团队将会为每一位客户提供最适合他们工件的机器。当我们的客户在机型上跟我们达成了共识，我们一般交机时间为45天除非是订单是特别的机型。

我们确保我们品质的方法就是在我们的工厂里制造从铸件开始所有的配件。我们对铸件进行精加工，做我们自己的钣金跟油漆来确保我们外观的美观。因为我们都是在自己的工厂里制造这些东西，所以我们可以更好的确保我们机床的品质跟交货时。

You have a very impressive corporate video, how long did it take to make it and do you have plans on offering an English version for customers who don’t speak Chinese? 你们有一个非常好的宣传录影带，请问你们是历经多久完成这个录影带的呢？ 你们有在计划出一个英文版本的录影带给那些不说中文的客户群吗？

Thank you for the compliment on our videos, that was another step we took to improve our image for our clients and to let others know more about Takam. It took us quite a while for the preparation before the shooting process, but because of the great team of production and the cooperativeness of our team it was a smooth filming process.

We currently are trying to solve this issue for our foreign non Chinese-speaking clients. First we will add an English sub title to our video first so this will temporarily take care of this issue but in the near future we will have an English speaking version with the video. So please closely follow our website for our updates.

We also have other sources of media supports for our clients, such as Weibo and WeChat in China, and for other regions we also have our facebook page and Linkedin page that our clients can always follow for updates and new product releases.

谢谢你对我们宣传带的赞赏，这是我们做出的另一步动作让更多的用户能对大金机械有更多的了解。 制作录影带的准备过程是漫长的，但是因为我们优秀的团队配合度是非常高的，我们在最短的时间内完成了这支录影带的制作。现在我们正在为我们国际客户解决没有英文版本录影带的问题。 首先我们会为这个录影带加上英文的字幕来暂时的解决这个问题。但是很快的我们也将会有一个英文解说的宣传带，请大家继续关注我们的官法网站。

另外我们还有提供许多的网络平台给我们的客户，使他们能随时知道我们企业的动态。在中国我们有大金机械的官方微博跟官方微信（QR Code 会呈现在下方），除中国以外的地方我们还有官方的脸书跟linkedin帐号随时为我们的客户提供我们最新的消息跟产品。

8) What are some of the goals that Takam has regarding growth and machine lineup for the coming year? 能请你分享一些大金机械明年的计划吗？ 然后能跟我们分享一下明年是否有计划新的机型出来？

In the year of 2014 our team at Takam has planned a broader network. As in 2013 we mainly focused in Mainland China and the European market. In 2014 we are broadening more location in China and expanding our global network to different countries such as South Africa, India, Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia.

In our machine line-ups we are currently under many research projects to provide our clients with larger and more precise machines to fulfill our special requests. With the smaller machines we are also researching for better and faster machining for our clients to help them speed up their production process to create a win-win situation for both parties.

在2014 大金机械的团队计划将扩大我们的销售网络。 在2013我们主要的着重在中国跟欧洲市场。 在2014 我们将会在中国设立更多的区域同时也在各国增加我们的销售网点到更多的国家，例如南非，印度，印度尼西亚， 泰国，马来西亚跟一些其他的国家。

在我们今年的生产计划中除了赶工我们已有的订单之外，我们专业的技术研发部门也正在为我们客户研发出更大更精准的数控机床来满足客户的特殊需求。 至于小型机床的部分我们也正在研发更好，加工速度更快的机床来帮助我们的用户节省生产时间创造出一个双赢的局面。

Anything else you’d like to add? 有什么其他你希望添加的吗？

We are currently looking for agents and dealers that we can work with in the long run and create a long lasting business relationship. If anyone is interested or have any questions regarding our products please don’t hesitate to contact us. You can always visit our website at www.takam.com or you can always email me at [email protected] ;  [email protected]

我们现在正在诚征可以长期合作的经销商。如果有兴趣或者有任何关于我们产品的问题，可以与我们联系。你可以到我们的官方网站www.takam.com, 或者随时给我发邮件[email protected] ; [email protected]