PMF sat down with Ishan Kamdar, who was made Managing Director of Luton-based parts business, Comline Auto Parts, at the start of 2019.
Q. For those not familiar, could you please tell us a little bit more about the history of Comline?
Ishan Kamdar (IK): The company was started by my father back in the late 90s. Originally, we started as a supplier of Japanese and Korean OE parts. My father and his colleague were importing parts from Japan, bringing them into the UK aftermarket, and selling them up and down the country. In 2002 or 2003, we decided that we were going to launch our own brands. We stuck with components for Japanese and Korean vehicles; mainly braking and filtration. That seemed to work quite well, particularly in a time when the aftermarket was changing. People were more focused on the value end of the market, which benefitted us. Then, in 2005, we decided to expand that out to more makes, European brands being the big addition. We moved to this site in Luton around the same time as well, as we started out in Wembley.
A big event occurred shortly before 2000, when my father met the owner of Allied Nippon, a brake pad manufacturing company based in India, at a trade show. Through the early 2000s they decided to begin a joint venture, which now gives us exclusivity to sell the Allied Nippon brand here in Europe.
Along the way, we made some acquisitions too, such as the purchase of a company and its warehouse in Athens, which now serves our eastern European market. We now own a company outside of Madrid, which serves as our western European hub. Two years ago, we bought a company just south of the Northern Irish border, and significantly, we also bought the Motaquip brand in 2014.
Q. How does Comline ensure its product ranges stay-up-to date with new technology?
IK: We belong to a group which manufactures, although we don’t manufacture ourselves. This means a lot of our progressive technology is based around brake pads. This includes working closely with the factories and their R&D ‘systems’. They are forever working on improving technology; RMR shims, noise reduction technology, or more recently, a bedding-in compound. On the other side, the distribution part of the business, we work with our factories to help them best bring these improvements to our market. We worked with our disc suppliers about four years ago to bring in coated discs. We work with our steering suppliers to improve erosion resistance through processes such as cataphoresis. In summary, collaboration with our partners is key to staying current.
Q. Is Comline doing anything to ensure it is a ‘responsible business’, specifically in relation to the environment and waste management?
IK: Companies definitely have a responsibility to show some progress in this area as best they can. We are continuously working to improve our environmental footprint. One of the main materials we work with as a distributor is cardboard; all of our packages come in boxes. For this reason, we have a fairly well developed recycling programme in place in all of our locations – we’re very conscious of where we can put cardboard back into the system, getting more use out of it when it would otherwise be discarded.
As I mentioned, we recently introduced coated discs to our repertoire. We now coat all of our discs with a unique waterbased compound, primarily to protect against corrosion and damage, pre- and post installation. A major knock-on benefit of this is that the discs no longer need oiling, and therefore, no longer need to live within a plastic bag inside the box. This is still a bit of a work in progress, but hopefully within the coming months and years, we can entirely eradicate the plastic element of packaging.
Q. What are your thoughts on the EV trend; flash in the pan, or the future of automotive?
IK: It’s certainly a big thing in our industry right now. To some, it’s the elephant in the room, to an extent. All of the vehicle manufacturers are putting most of their R&D efforts into electric cars, and many have released multiple models to the marketplace. Clearly, it is not only going to affect our business, but our customers’ too. We are wary of it, and know that we have to be prepared for it. Today, we already sell a lot of parts for fully-electric and hybrid vehicles. We sell brake pads and discs for EVs, and some filters for hybrids. As more EVs find their way onto the road, and as technology develops, we are going to be ready to bring those products into our range as well. As a business, we have to be proactive and adaptive.
Q. Back in 2017, PMF visited Comline here in Luton and came away having learned about some of the company’s recent feats, including entering the FT1000. What achievements are Comline proud of in 2019?
IK: One of the things that we really developed over the last three to four years is the extent to which we are exporting our products outside of Europe. We sell into Russia, the CIS countries, all the way down to Georgia and Azerbaijan, and we do a lot of work in northern Africa, in Morocco and Algeria. Because of the Spanish office and the language skills that come with it, Comline has now found a place in South America as well. Peru, Ecuador, Columbia and Cuba are all areas we are looking to focus on. The UK market is still 30% of our overall business, but our global reach of over 45 countries is something we are very proud of.
I took over from my father as the MD of this business in January of this year, and since then, we have tried to take a look at how we structure the business – in particular, how we go to market. One of the other focuses is to more closely consider what our customer wants from us. This comes back to the way the industry is changing. We need to be right behind our customers, working with them to develop our range according to their needs. In short, one thing I am very proud of is how close we have become with our customers in the past six months.
Q. A prominent issue recently is the way in which data is handled. What is Comline’s stance on this?
IK: Big corporations in general, but more specifically, data-driven companies like Facebook and Instagram, have had to consider how consumer information is handled in the last ten years or so. As a result, we’ve changed the way we look at big data, too. In our industry, it’s the importance of platforms like MAM and TecDoc which have led us to look at how products are catalogued. Accuracy is essential, so we’re now A-rated on both of the aforementioned platforms. We’re also conscious of how we are gathering information from our customers and suppliers. This helps us to get our logistics as efficient as possible, and pricing as accurate as possible.
Q. Is there any advice you would offer factor staff?
IK: I think, without generalising, there are a fair few ‘old school’ factors and garages out there, and there is a lot of reluctance to change (especially when it comes to technology). It wasn’t that long ago that factors got computers in for the first time, or garages had to invest massive amounts of money into diagnostics systems. What I want to say to factor branches in the UK is this: work with your suppliers, and treat them as partners rather than another link in the supply chain. Feed back to us: “‘this’ is what’s going on in the marketplace, ‘this’ is what I need help with.” We are here, ready, and willing and able to listen. If, for example, a component wears particularly quickly, or if a part for a recent vehicle doesn’t exist in the aftermarket, bring it forward to us. We can work to improve on any issues to give you the edge and make the sale.
The last piece of advice I would like to offer is about planning for the future. Comline is a family company, and a lot of our customers are family-run factors and garages. It’s a very community-based industry, particularly at aftermarket level. So, what I would recommend is to start succession planning, or if that is not a possibility, start enticing a new wave of young talent into the industry. The industry needs factors and independent garages in the future.
