During yesterday's activities at Tijuana Innovadora under the banner of Innovative Organizational Excellence, the first part of the conference was about the success of companies from Baja California abroad and nationwide.

The panel was moderated by Juan Manuel Hernandez, businessman and former president of COPARMEX. Representing other institutions that were invited was, Marquez Maria Eugenia Acevedo who serves as General Director of Certus Clinical Laboratory, Jae Chul Nam who serves as General Manager of Skyworks Solution of Mexico, Aaron H. from TurboTec and Ignacio Vazquez Fimbres Sánchez, President of the Calimax Group.

For 60 minutes, the guests spoke about the challenges of maintaining quality and excellence in their respective rubles, while highlighting the importance of working conditions and environment, and also the quality of employees and how to manage the business.

Skyworks currently employs 2,600 people in the Mexicali plant that focuses on the creation of semiconductors for wireless communications networks, a product that can be found in almost any cell phone, and are also involved in the medical and automotive industries. Jae Chul Nam said Skyworks focuses in three main areas: Quality, Cost and Production.

Aaron Vazquez from TurboTec said that part of their success, is because of the safety culture that has been implemented in the plant, which also has become an example for other companies that deal with Solar Turbines, that now in consequence is also part of their foundation in their new building in the Czech Republic. Vazquez gave some recognition also to the quality of education in the state of Baja California, since TurboTec employs several technicians and engineers recently graduated, who most of them are part of the team of the new plant.

Certus and Calimax shared their success story about their business, and also their business formulas, which both had started as small businesses and today have international recognition. How did they do it?

Maria Eugenia Acevedo, said that one of the most important things is to know what are the goals of the company, which is a strong foundation, and also that the a balance between the technology available combined with the talent of each employee was important, and that each member should understand the goals of the company for a perfect execution of operations, and always give more than what the customer expected.

Ignacio Fimbres spoke about the challenge of consolidating a company over time. Globally, 85% of businesses are run by family only, of which only 30% survive to a second generation, and only 8% to a third generation. The Calimax Group has been governed by a "Corporate Governance", which as one of the main qualities sought is the protection and balance for shareholders besides establishing roles for each of them. Currently the Calimax Group consists of three families who work together towards new growth targets.

To end the conference the experts talked about the key to creating a world-class company, which consists of a combination of several factors:

a) To conceive an idea and make a good team

b) Identify the strengths of the company and constantly continue to improve them.

c) A passionate team that commits to their activities and the business.

d) Encourage investment and support to educational institutions.

e) Constant and continues training.

Brenda.Colon@sandiegored.com

Translation: Omar.Martinez@sandiegored.com