Jens-Christian Møller, President, Eryk Group
Read the original text in Danish – click here
Translation from Danish chronicle:
While we are still waiting for the [Danish] government’s Africa plan, I would like to greet you from Africa and say that the Americans and Chinese have already seen the business opportunities in Nigeria, while the majority of Danish companies are conspicuous by their absence.
At the end of the last millennium, I was employed as CEO of KK Wind Solutions, which was in the process of internationalisation. After a thorough analysis, it was clear to me that the arrow pointed towards the north-western Poland – specifically Szczecin. KK Wind Solutions became the first Danish industrial enterprise in Szczecin and has grown from a turnover of less than 100 million DKK to over 5 billion DKK. Today, Szczecin has become a natural choice for industrial companies worldwide, and following Vestas’ significant investments in two large factories, it is set to become a future hub for the offshore wind industry and global green transition.
Danish industrial companies dominate the region with over 10,000 jobs, which greatly contributed to King Frederik X choosing Szczecin for his first official trip abroad after his inauguration.
Together with my partner, we founded Eryk Group in 2004, and we have been here ever since.
There is a clear analogy between the development that Poland has experienced over the past 25 years and the challenges Nigeria now is facing. For the past 10 years, my partner and I looked beyond Europe’s borders to find the right bridgehead for our continued development. It has been a long process, and we have scrapped many plans, once we got the facts about the intended location. In 2017, we began to look at Africa as our future continent. We looked at North Africa and Sub-Saharan Africa in the east and west. In 2018, we made our first overall feasibility study together with two Danish Embassy Offices in West Africa. In 2019, we started employing West Africans in our organisation and now we have over 50 West Africans colleagues. In 2023, together with the University of Southern Denmark, we made a feasibility study regarding establishment in Nigeria, where most of our employees come from. In fact, more than half comes from one Nigerian city – namely Lagos, where we established our own limited liability company at the beginning of 2024.
It is difficult both to find and retain young European engineers and technicians. Whenever we search for new European technicians, we often receive only a single application. And in 2023, we had a dropout rate of over 25 percent within the first year. Not because the young people are dissatisfied – they just find out that they want something else.
In comparison, we employ an average of one Nigerian technical employee per week, and through our collaboration with universities and technical schools in Nigeria, we receive over 100 competent applications every month. In 2023, the dropout rate of young Nigerian employees was 0. Nigerians score significantly higher on technical competence tests than their European colleagues. Our corporate language is English and the Nigerians are native English speakers. The young Europeans we employ do not have the same level of English at all. In general, I find our Nigerian employees to be well educated, ambitious and loyal. They adapt easily to our Danish company culture. In many ways, they are much easier to onboard than Europeans – they are simply far more adaptable than the rest of us.
It has been a long and expensive journey for the Eryk Group. We have ended up in a lot of dead ends because we knew very little when we started. But as a family-owned business, we have held firm and have made money all the time while ”developing Africa.” We have acquired some unique African competences, which we now see as a strength for future sustainable growth. 25 years ago, Poland needed pioneering Danish companies that were willing to take risks, with the expectation that, in the long run, they could recoup their investments and gain competitive advantages. Now the time has come for Nigeria. At Eryk, we are happy to invite you in and share our knowledge. Join us on an exciting journey – the train is already moving – jump on!
Lagos now feels much closer to me. For the next 20 years of my working life, I will dedicate myself to my “African dream”. It is great to be a self-financed entrepreneur with the opportunity to embark on yet another exciting ”business journey ”. I enjoy being with my young African team.
The goal is to grow from 50 African employees we have now to over 1000 and to once again be the first-mover, as we were 25 years ago in Szczecin. Maybe in 20 years, I can enjoy my retirement in a rocking chair in Lagos, where I can sit in the sun and look out over the Atlantic Ocean. Even grown-ups are allowed to dream.
There is a clear analogy between the development Poland has experienced over the past 25 years and the challenges Nigeria now is facing. For the past 10 years, my partner and I looked beyond Europe’s boarders to find the right bridgehead for our continued development.
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