Titov Buzescu, 47, the new retail and marketing vice-president with Rompetrol oil group, says expansion is the anti-crisis solution, with one of the first moves to this end being to boost the sales team by almost 40%.
"The strategy in this period is to expand and cement activities. For instance, the sales team of Rompetrol Downstream (the retail unit) has increased by 40% since year start and we now have around 2,000 employees. We managed to boost sales in volumes by over 7% in the first quarter and in the second quarter they continued to rise by over 10% from the same period of 2008," explains Buzescu, who took the reins of retail and marketing activities starting April 1.
At present, Rompetrol group is 100% owned by KazMunaiGaz state-owned Kazakh company, after late last week Dinu Patriciu announced he had sold his remaining 25% stake. It is not only the deal by which Patriciu exited Rompetrol that attention has been focused on in the past two weeks, but also the decision of Rompetrol Downstream shareholders to discuss a capital increase of 630m RON (150m euros) in late July, conducted by Rompetrol Rafinare (RRC), the company operating Petromidia refinery.
Rompetrol Downstream in 2008 generated 1.92bn-euro turnover, accounting for around 23-25% on the fuel market, according to its own estimates. The company has cumulated loses of around 29m euros, though.
Before joining Rompetrol group, Buzescu gained a 12 years' experience with Coca-Cola HBC.
He says this year the segment he runs will have to make do with 30m dollars, below last year's funds, but above rivals'. Rompetrol representative says that though demand at the level of major corporate clients has dwindled since year start, it is starting to rebound also as a result of the expansion of the sales team.
The segments that offset losses on the corporate client side were those of Rompetrol Express mobile stations, with sales three times higher than last year, and internal bases. One of the problems companies are now going through is customers' late payments. Buzescu says the time interval these payments are made in has doubled from last year's 26-28 days.
As regards the domestic oil market, Buzescu believes this is likely to rebound next year and gradually get back to 2007 volumes.
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