Lock Engenharia: High Standard Construction Sector in Brazil

Interview with Eduardo Menezes, CEO of Lock Engenharia

Could you please start the interview by telling us about the construction sector in Brazil?

The sector was living in the expectation of the presidential elections. And the results weren’t what people expected. It was clear that when the tendency of the voting was favorable to Dilma, the stock exchange dropped, but things will have to go on track and people will have to realign and keep doing what they do: the ones that build will still be building and the ones that incorporate will be incorporating.

I think we will have a 3 month period to get used to it and, afterwards, we will enter a slower rhythm that will not be as slow as it is now.

Could you tell us a little bit about the company’s history?

Lock Engenharia was founded 27 years ago. It started in the commercial segment building stores.

During the 90’s we had the Collor Plan: all our activities came to a stop and Lock was not able to pay salaries to the employees. We believed it wouldn’t last too long and decided to try to maintain the team for quite a while. The situation seemed like it wouldn’t be solved in a short period and Lock incurred in very high debts. After that period was over, Lock entered in its true vocation, which was high standard construction, mainly high standard residential complexes – a market that was above any crisis.

Over the years, Lock entered other types of designs and, today, it has 4 main areas: commercial (stores, restaurants and hotels), very high-standard residential construction, corporate (very big offices of huge international brands), and 2 years ago we started building residential buildings (we already have 9 buildings which were very well accepted due to Lock’s high standards – any residential building with Lock’s name on it aggregates value.

How would you define the company’s philosophy, and what are your competitive advantages?

Lock has two very clear sides: the human side (people feel good working with us and we feel like a family) and the results side (we love methods, management, innovation). Our values are very clear and well defined – when one of those values is missing, things will not work out.

Our values are a challenge due to the delivery time and the quality we deliver.

Excellence and Ethics are also our values. We have the ethics to admit when we are wrong and we do not blame others for our mistakes.

The passion for what we do and our sense of urgency are also great values we have.

I would like you to talk a little bit about some success cases and some projects you worked on and that define Lock.

We have several success cases. We have been building residential buildings for 2 years now and we achieved the “Master Prize” in the area, which is the top prize of the real estate sector. On the night we were awarded the prize, our product was also chosen as the best product among all the prizewinners.

We have a house in Paraty that was awarded with 16 prizes.

We were chosen to build the first Apple store here, and we are building the second one too.

Here at the company we like to learn and to always be innovative.

Which are the company’s plans in terms of expansion?

We build throughout Brazil. The market here in Sao Paulo is huge and we still have a lot to grow here. Going into other places to build depends on the opportunities and also of the conditions of the other place.

We are currently building 7 stores in Roraima. One of our old clients wanted more quality in construction that the region couldn’t offer, and we accepted to build there in favorable conditions for both of us.

Are there investment opportunities inside the company? Are you interested in any type of partnership?

Lock is an engineering company complemented by an architecture company. We have several partnerships with several architects on several sectors.

We have a product called “Design Build” where we offer a complete solution. We adequate the client’s budget to a high level of quality, design and materials.

These types of partnerships are very usual within the company. Those companies that align themselves with our policy and values are good candidates for partnerships.

What are your expectations for the company 3 years from now?

Lock has a constant organic and consistent growth. We are at the moment investing a lot in IT (circa 1.5 million Brazilian reals). We want to be the company with the best and more innovative IT. This will create the basis for a bigger and more sustainable growth within an important technological base that will enable us to have more scale.

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