ESKO Pacific provides world class solutions

Original article on Paper Advance

As the company looks toward the future by building on lessons learned and recent success, PaperAdvance took the opportunity to ask Esko Pacific about its objectives for the North American market, how it stays ahead of the technological curve, and where it plans to focus its R&D efforts.

• What can you tell our North American readers about Esko Pacific? A little bit of history.

In 2006, with decades of experience and a solid understanding of customer needs, ESKO Industries pivoted and launched its line of flow metering products. ESKO Pacific Sales and started manufacturing in the Pacific Northwest.  Esko’s family and loyal employees transformed the business to include manufacturing and technical services.

Venalainen’s son, Markku, began his career with the Company 40 years ago, and today sits at the helm, as President. Decades later, the familiar ESKO logo is featured on equipment across the continent. Businesses, friends, and family fondly recall Esko’s upbeat style and energy that remains a constant over the years.  

• How do you define teamwork and how important is it for the growth of ESKO?

Teamwork blends knowledge and resources to create innovative solutions for customer needs. We gather feedback and work together to combine technical expertise with new ideas and valuable input from all levels. The ESKO team is committed to creating innovative, cost-effective solutions that exceed customers’ expectations. 

We work together to continuously improve our locally manufactured products with modular design principles. We seek to understand process optimization from the customer’s perspective, which helps inform product design at all stages. Teamwork is critical to this process. Working together enables us to meet unique and complex customer needs and maintain reliable product lines and exceptional delivery times. 

Learning from our customers, working with seasoned team members, and using high-quality components propels ESKO’s growth and advancement into a wider spectrum of industries and applications. 

• Can you tell us more about your capabilities?

• What are your objectives in developing the North American market?

ESKO’s vision is to supply products that minimize waste, reduce energy consumption and maximize process uptime.  We want to share the means to process optimization across the continent. 

ESKO believes in the power of effective communication with our clients. We facilitate the sharing of valuable know-how between our team and our customers. Our primary customer base is the pulp and paper industry. In developing the North American market, we apply our experience to connect with other process industries with similar metering and monitoring needs. Other industries we serve include mining, manufacturing, petrochemical, food processing and many others.

We promote communication by offering highly accessible technical assistance. Customers can select products using online resources, printed media and with our continuous direct customer contact. We choose to work with experienced and knowledgeable local distributors.  In addition to making flow meters, ESKO also offers world class in-house developed felt guiding systems. We also represent select complementary European product lines because we believe in the quality of those products. We carry inventory to make these products accessible to the North American market. Popular lines include Assalub grease lubrication products, DropsA lubrication systems and Tempress level and pressure gauges.

• How does Esko Pacific stay ahead of the technological curve?

ESKO anticipates customer needs through ongoing two-way communication. Our development team works with customer feedback to research, modify existing designs, re-engineer parts, offer custom calibration, and other options to create new product solutions. In response to a customer request for a challenging industrial environment, we expanded our product line with our first stainless steel body seal water monitor.    

• What does continuous improvement mean to you when it comes to technology?

Continuously watching manufacturing trends ensures we maintain quality in our product components and keep our prices stable. We monitor trends in process management to anticipate upcoming process industry needs. Our team identifies and makes product design improvements, tweaks component designs and works with customer suggestions to explore model variations and configurations. These continuous activities enable ESKO to consistently supply leading edge products that integrate with evolving technology. We are exploring technology trends that favor digital interfaces, real-time monitoring and collecting process information for trending and analysis.

Continuous improvement at ESKO means making things work better for us and for our customers. Our founder’s attitude to challenges was how to get something done, not whether it can be done. His legacy lives on in the way we approach technology today.  

• What are your objectives for EP in the next year? Five years?

ESKO has been in business for nearly 40 years and we look proudly and confidently toward the future. Our objectives for the next year and beyond are to stay connected with our customer base, connect with new industries and emerging young professionals, and stay ahead of the curve with what’s happening in industrial markets across the globe. 

Looking at a five-year time frame, we’ve already started growing our business and manufacturing facilities to keep our delivery times exceptional and provide ongoing product service and customization. Our goal is to grow the company at a healthy pace, focussing on continuity and quality by balancing the needs of established customers with the exploration of new markets in North America and abroad.

• What do your R&D efforts focus on?

Research and development is ongoing at ESKO, and relies on customer input.  Every team member contributes suggestions to component and manufacturing improvements and ongoing product innovations.

One directed area of research and development is ongoing work on optimizing oil lubrication systems. Our team is exploring and devising ways to more readily integrate our oil monitoring and lubrication metering systems with existing mill systems.

• What percentage of your business goes towards Research & Development?

A growing interest in sustainability is making an impact on industry. We are anticipating and responding to increased interest in environmental controls and adaptations being implemented across all industries. ESKO will look for ways to contribute to developing standards and industry initiatives with a focus on process monitoring.

• What do you think is the most important quality for success?

Success is founded on vision and commitment. ESKO is passionate about our history, accumulated experience and the resulting products we make today. We place a high value on customer and partner relationships.  Integrity is a priority in all aspects of our business dealings and in the way we treat our team members.  Our team prides itself on being a reliable source of straightforward information about metering, monitoring and process optimization. We share our knowledge whether or not it results in an immediate sale.  

• What trends have you seen in the pulp and paper industry over the last 5 years? and what do you see being the future?

The use of process data as part of optimizing production is increasingly common.  Artificially intelligent systems and the internet of things are developing quickly. ESKO is excited to be part of the data revolution. We’re refining methods of recording and trending process data and interfacing to existing mill systems. Real time information trending and analysis is fundamental in process management.

ESKO will continue to look to the future. The simplicity and reliability of our products is enduring and future applications are limitless. ESKO was proud to participate in one vision of the future in the making of the Universal Pictures film “Chronicles of Riddick”.   In the movie, an ESKO oval gear meter formed part of the cryo-suspension system used during interstellar space travel. Perhaps this may become a reality some day!