18-11-2015

History of
internationalization
(Sme)

Mireia Pérez, Isabel Sánchez

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS HISTORY
INDEX
INTRODUCTION………………………………………………… PAGE 2

SEGMENT AND PRODUCTION ……………………………...… PAGE 2

LOCATION AND DIRECTOR………………………………...… PAGE 2

EMPLOYEES…………………………………………………. PAGE 2

HISTORY OF INTERNATIONALIZATION……………………PAGE 3

A SHORT TOUR BY IMEDEXSA…………………………….PAGE 3

EMPLOYEES………………………………………………… PAGE 4

INNOVATION ………………………………………………….PAGE 4

MAIN COMPETENCES ……………………………………..….PAGE 5

CONCLUSIONS………………………………………………….PAGE 6

BIBLIOGRAPHY…………………………………………………PAGE 7

1
INTRODUCTION
Segment and production

Imedexsa (Industrias Mecánicas de Extremadura S.A) is a public limited

society. Pioneer in the development of the metallurgical and mining sectors in
Extremadura, the company engages in the model and manufacture of different
kind of pylons. Nevertheless, its activity does not finish here: Imedexsa has also
an important role in all Spanish electric companies, being supplier of a huge
variety of wind parks and cooperating with their engineering projects.

Besides the high voltage towers for power lines, crossheads and ironworks for
concrete's posts, the company also covers the production of telecommunication
and illumination towers. However, nowadays its main actions are being those
related to electrification towers of railway lines and photovoltaic solar energy
systems.

Location and director

The company is based on Casar de Cáceres, a town near to the city of

Cáceres, where its roots flourished in 1979, being its director the Industrial
engineer Luis Felipe de la Morena.

Employees

IMEDEXSA counts with 80 employees working in the company, distributed in

five departments: commercial, production, technical, administration and
information.

They are one of the most important parts in the company’s work, so they are
always supported in their decisions and actions and also their ideas and
innovations are taken in account. In IMEDEXSA, all workers work as a team
being their mistakes but also their successes effort of all of them.

2
HISTORY OF INTERNATIONALIZATION
A short tour by IMEDEXSA

As we have mentioned before, IMEDEXSA was founded in 1979 and their roots
were totally humble. The company started its activity as a little locksmith's shop
where they manufactured cattle's gates.

However, they did not take much time in change their market perspective and
decided to improve its activity. In 1981, IMEDEXSA decided to lead its way
within electric sector through the manufacturing of small metallic towers
destined to Extremaduran region.

Firstly, the company was formed by different companies, but in 1990, an

enterprise from Madrid acquires all the shares, causing along with the electric
sector crisis in 1994, an important cease payment.

Despite the collapse period, after 1995, IMEDEXSA suffered a total

restructuring thanks to a shareholder's change which passed at the hands of D.
Gregorio Peña. The company started to nationalize their products and improved
the size and quality of their staff, as until the moment the enterprise only
counted with an Industrial Technical Engineer and a draftsman. Moreover, Luis
Felipe de la Morena was named executive director.

Then, IMEDEXSA suffered a wave of offers on the part of the main Spanish
electric companies as Endesa, Gas Natural, Iberdrola, REE... Since then, the
enterprise has changed its role as one of the poorest and latest of the sector
until take place within the leaders.

With the arrival of the new millennium and the current crisis, IMEDEXSA has
always searched for creating a new image of the company to be able to stand
out. Firstly, the company started with some technical improvements by which
they could offer new products, taking into account its main purpose is the quality
provided. However, this improvements were not enough to the company and
went on increasing the number of its specialist staff, which has allow them to
internationalize their production.

3
Nowadays, IMEDEXSA has an important presence in part of the African
continent, where it has already placed their pylons in more than twenty or so
countries. In the American continent, the company is present in countries as
Venezuela, Nicaragua or Argentina. In Europe, countries as Germany and
France would be mentioned, in addition to Moldavia, Arabia Saudi and Syria.

Nevertheless, IMEDEXSA is not present in all that countries. The secret of the
company is to have stablished lines with native companies or Spanish
companies stablished in different places around the world. The enterprise
moves all the operations from its factory located on Cáceres.

Employees

Currently there are around 80 employees working in the Company, distributed

in five departments: commercial, production, technical, administration and
information. The main objective of IMEDEXSA is to transfer the entrepreneurial
idea to every worker and make them feel supported in their initiatives. The
director’s company is very aware that for achieving that goal time is necessary,
and he is not afraid of investing it in employees’ training.

Finally, IMEDEXA’s employees are very conscious that to keep on innovating

and growing as a Company they have to feel good about what they do in order
to succeed as a group. They also know that no matter what mistake they do, the
will be supported and act as a team.

“Better a bad action than a good thought”

Innovation

In a factory of this size, new technologies have played a very important role
when internationalization and have been essential to their growth and
development.

The company has implemented a new system that help their customer as it
facilitates the design, calculation and the draft of powered lines. This program
has been fully developed in the company and allowed them to move through

4
different countries around the world. Moreover, they have a cutting-edge
technology constantly updated.

Currently, they are full of inventions, automatic machining, etc., that accelerate
their work, leaving more time to implement new ideas and, therefore, continue
to grow.

Main competences

IMEDEXSA has always tried to innovate and search solutions to new market
demands, pursuing profitability in all their projects. Has we have seen, their
employees have also developed professionally through training tailored to
individual and collective needs.

As their values we can highlight the continuous search for innovation and use of
resources available to the organization in the sector, always acting in a spirit of
cooperation and respect for all people working in the Company, the customers,
its suppliers and anyone who has any kind of relationship. They have worked to
achieve the best customer satisfaction and identify their needs to anticipate
market trends. Finally their actuations always entail a self-critical attitude to
achieve continuous improvement of their system.

All this competences on the whole have made the Company be where it is in
terms of internationalization.

5
CONCLUSIONS
IMEDEXSA was created by the engineer Luis Felipe de la Morena, and it
started in 1979 as a little locksmith in the town of Cáceres. The company has
not stop growing since then and nowadays, it turnover of 26 million euros a
year, 11% of which come from foreign markets.

Many SMEs close its doors limiting its scope to the local market. Such strategic
decisions may come motivated by a lack of self-confidence or business vision.
However IMEDEXSA did not hesitate to invest time and effort and to get ready
for jumping into a global market and internationalize its product. Confidence in
company workers and the desire to improve day by day were key to make this
decision. What makes this company so successful is definitely their spirit of
overcoming and daily work.

Moreover, its director has very clear that employees are the main fact of any
company as it cannot work without them. As a result, in IMEDEXSA, a very
important part of the time is invested in them: their formation, their ideas,
needs… EVERY WORKER COUNTS: they are always supported. Their
actions, ideas entrepreneurship are one of the most important things and what
has taken the company where it is nowadays. IMEDEXSA foments the team
work, and as we can see, it is actually very useful.

Innovation has also been very important in their process of internationalization.

IMEDEXSA has always tried to improve day by day. New ideas and projects
have been delivered to give a better service, always thinking in their customers
and the market needs. Nevertheless, how innovation is being focused is
changing rapidly. After a period in which the term innovation was associated
only to technological innovation, currently the innovative companies’ activity
companies is being addressed from a broader perspective. IMEDEXSA has
managed to keep these changes in innovation and adapt to the rapid changes
of the times.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY
https://books.google.es/books?id=_qurCQAAQBAJ&pg=PA41&lpg=PA41&dq=i
medexsa+pyme&source=bl&ots=dqR2taG4kW&sig=CUfyVgKTapgcONU_3Zgjl
MeCwOk&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCAQ6AEwAGoVChMIn-
GZ9OyPyQIVw7oaCh1nhAEc#v=onepage&q=imedexsa%20pyme&f=false

http://www.elperiodicoextremadura.com/noticias/caceres/luis-felipe-morena-
gerente-imedexsa-hemos-acabado-tranvia-oran-ahora-estamos-ave-medina-la-
meca_833700.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_860I4qV3lg

http://www.santelmo.org/revista/n19/ENTREVISTA_IMEDEXSA.pdf

http://www.imedexsa.es/public/seccion02.asp?ids=2&idss=0

http://casardecaceres.hoy.es/gente-cercana/2012-06-04/no-somos-amigos-
pelotazos-sino-2122.html

http://www.hoy.es/v/20100712/regional/postes-cacerenos-para-20100712.html

http://www.canalextremadura.es/alacarta/tv/videos/tu-empleo-capacidades-y-
competencias-del-trabajor-170215

http://grupoorion.unex.es:8001/rid=1HVQ2MCG8-2B6ZWY6-
7006/Cat%C3%A1logo%20Imedexsa%202009

https://www.unglobalcompact.org/system/attachments/18245/original/informe_I
ndustrias_Mecanicas_de_Extremadura_SA__IMEDEXSA_.pdf?1351177317

http://extremambiente.gobex.es/files/Informacion%20Publica/2013/nvbre/rnt-
AAU%2013-100.pdf