With an extensive business portfolio that extends across medical, manufacturing, metrology, optics, microscopy and more, ZEISS has been innovating with vision since 1846. The German-founded optical systems specialist has an expansive presence across South East Asia, working hard to serve its niche clientele with the most cutting-edge solutions. Ven Raman, Managing Director at ZEISS, first became associated with the business after working for one of its Malaysian distributors as an engineering graduate fresh out of university.
Seven years later, he was reunited with the business to take up the general manager role in Malaysia, before moving to Singapore within 2 years to head up the Medical Technology Business Group for South East Asia (SEA). After many years heading up the medical unit, spearheading the expansion into India, tripling its top-line revenues, integrating the eye-glass unit with mainstream business, and setting up representative offices in Vietnam, Indonesia, and the Philippines, Ven’s key focus is now on the SEA markets. His aim? To simplify a very complex and varied 10-country market in order to create a lean, nimble and borderless operating model.
We chat with Ven about his time with the business, noteworthy innovations, and new works in the pipeline.
The CEO Magazine: ZEISS has a wide range of business functions across SEA; how do the markets vary from region to region?
Ven: When operating in SEA, you quickly learn that each business is strongest in one market. With the metrology business, where we make coordinate-measuring machines for manufacturing sites, our main clients are in the automotive sector. In SEA, Thailand is the hub for carmakers, so 50% of our metrology business comes out of Thailand. Then if you take microscopy, which is primarily addressing the research market, Singapore is a hub for research activities for SEA, so that’s where the biggest business for microscopy is in the region.
However, then you have the medical business, which is the largest across the whole of SEA, representing almost 50% of all ZEISS business in the region. This means the work we do across each market is more equal because we see that healthcare demands from all emerging countries is growing. We see quite substantial growth happening in the new emerging markets in the medical industry, and that’s across the board.
What do you enjoy most about working with ZEISS and the industries it targets?
My fundamental values marry very well with what the company involves, so it’s a very good match for me. I’ve been with the company 22 years, and I think that’s partially because of the uniqueness of ZEISS. The business is owned by a foundation, so we don’t have shareholders breathing down our necks and looking at quarter-to-quarter results. We can think more in the long term and take a longer view of the markets and the businesses we’re engaging with. The profits from the organisation go back into the company, mostly into new technology developments, and I’m a freak for technology.
“We’re also always seeking out quality partnerships with research facilities and companies to expand our outreach and continue to produce the same high quality and innovation well into the future.”– Ven Raman
I love the innovation that happens across all our business sectors and portfolios; we spend 10–12% of our revenues in innovation, which therefore allows us to keep our edge in terms of the technologies we work with and create. That makes it very hard to get disrupted. You see many other companies going through those challenges today, but here we enable the disruption. From that angle, I still see a long and successful future ahead. ZEISS is also a strong brand, so everywhere I go, from Alaska to the Indian jungle, people know the company, or they’ve used our products, which makes me feel a sense of pride.
With so much focus and investment on innovation, have there been any new products you’ve been most proud of?
I can certainly pick a few of my favourites from over the years. In the domain of refractive surgery for a procedure called SMILE — an acronym for Small Incision Lenticule Extraction — we were the pioneers in coming up with technologies where you don’t have to flap the whole cornea during the procedure, so in a sense we keep the eye intact, which makes the recovery much faster. It’s a very simple procedure and technology-dependent, so surgeons are more competent and patients can get perfect vision within a day.
Our primary focus is always to get better clinical outcomes for patients — in this case, better vision post surgery. In our eyeglass products, we’ve also come up with a ‘digital lens’ for people who are forced to be glued to computers and gadgets for significant periods of time. It has a special coating that cuts away the blue light and prevents eye strain. We’ve also produced the DriveSafe lens, which helps drivers to see better in difficult conditions, and ensures a driver’s vision is not compromised despite having to constantly look at maps, mirrors and traffic. These are quite simple and yet very innovative.
What key elements of ZEISS make it stand out among its competitors?
Our main focus has always been on maintaining a strong brand, using cutting-edge technology to create lasting, high-quality products. We’re focusing more on how we can embrace digital solutions in both our customer interactions and overall product offerings to relieve some of the burden on industries like healthcare. We also work in a very niche market; therefore, the expectations of our customers is extremely high. When they buy from ZEISS, there’s no compromising the quality. Because of this, we put a lot of emphasis on our people: we need them to be the expert at everything that they do. Most of our microscopy application specialists are PhD holders; with our refractive lasers, our application specialists are qualified ophthalmologists, so a lot of emphasis is on growing our talent pool.
“We’re also constantly seeking out quality partnerships with research facilities and companies to expand our outreach and continue to produce the same high quality and innovation for our customers well into the future, always with our customers’ success in mind.”