From the desk of Peter M. Brobyn, Director, APAC, Atlas Furniture Asia Ltd.
This press release outlines the appointment of several key members of staff to our company across our multiple locations, as well as to announce the return of Ms. Vivi Deng, Executive Assistant to Mr Brobyn.
These have been some of the most testing months of not only this year, but of my entire 40-plus years in the furniture industry. Through perseverance, dedication and discipline, my staff have not only come through this stronger and more together, but we have grown our team in size to represent the huge boost in sales that we have been enjoying.
It has been a real test and I like to think we are a strong, closer team as a result.
Peter M. Brobyn, Director, APAC, Atlas Furniture Asia
OFFICIAL APPOINTMENT TO HEAD OF VIETNAM
Diversification into other manufacturing zones has been our focus for 3 years now and Vietnam is fast-becoming our main source of manufacturing partners for wood products, such as our ‘Countryside’ collection of wooden beds and bunks. As our business has grown there exponentially in the past 12 months, we knew it was time to build a full-time team here.
Our recently appointed Head of Vietnam has had huge experience sourcing and manufacturing high-quality products out of Vietnam for many years now and their professional network amongst factories, auditing teams and logistics companies is second-to-none.
They will be working closely alongside fellow AFA Director Peter Brobyn to ensure that the 2 teams (indoor products / rattan & outdoor products / beds etc.) based full-time in Vietnam are delivering the Atlas quality across all product ranges.
Despite the current ‘situation’, the new Head of Vietnam is in daily contact with our 7 Vietnam-based staff, including the 2 new hires mentioned below (Q.A. & Q.C.)
I’ve been serving as Atlas Furniture Asia Director in a more advisory capacity for around 1 year now.
…they said of their role at Atlas,
…however, with the explosive growth in Vietnam and demand for the fantastic wood products they produce, we knew it was time to formalise the Atlas team in Vietnam
Atlas’ newest exec-level hire sees their most important task in this new role to bring the new Quality Team in-line with AFA’s well-established quality systems and procedures.
Being remote during the recent ‘situation’ has allowed us to refine our systems and upgrade our documentation like never before
…mentions Mr Brobyn,
…and it was in seeing how remote and yet so connected our company had become through necessity, we knew we were confident to launch this new division of our company. Under close leadership, AFA customers should expect nothing less than the world-class quality and service that has led us to become one of the most respected players in the international furniture industry.
New Quality Control Manager (China) – Mr Steven Zou
A local of Longgang district in Shenzhen, where the Atlas Furniture Asia Operation Head Offices are located, Steven got his Masters in Business Administration from Lanzhou University, whilst working simultaneously as Q.C. Manager for E.C.I. Furniture Company in Dongguan. We are pleased to announce that he has accepted the Senior Manager-level position of ‘QC Manager’ for Atlas Furniture Asia, starting on August 24th, 2020.
Steven takes the lead ahead of our 6-strong Quality Assurance team based in China, running quality assurance for Atlas and their customers across South China.
Manager Zou has worked across numerous business units within the furniture and small goods industries, including, but not limited to:
- QC Manager
- Team Manager
- Office Manager
- Trading Manager / Supervisor
- Product Development Manager
Steven’s work with foreign companies included time in U.S.A. at both manufacturing plants and in High Point NC, where the world’s largest static furniture trade fair is located.
“With almost 20 years in the industry, furniture is my life,” Steven says. “When Mr Brobyn asked me to join his team and outlined the plans he has for the coming 3 – 5 years, I knew it was the next phase of my career.”
Steven joins Atlas to lead QCs John & King, as well as our long-serving QC Engineer Eric. “We will also be announcing a new addition to the Quality Team in the coming days as I have been giving the green-light to expand the team.” Manager Zou explains.
Mr Brobyn outlined the growth plan, stating “up until around 6 months ago, the QC Manager position was a fairly hard one for us to fulfil. People were unsure about making major career changes and the uncertainty left people holding on to whatever they had. Not only did we keep Atlas going, but we retained all staff on 100% salary and have doubled turnover in 6 months against what we did in a full year last year – we knew it was time to grow and grow fast.” Now that many unsure futures have been confirmed as ‘not what one might have been planning’, “our hiring pool just exploded!”
Ms.Vivi Deng, the Executive Assistant to Mr Brobyn, was part of the hiring team, and reflects on the change in the situation: “we went from having a handful of candidates from different industries to a large list of world-class, highly qualified, highly experienced potential hires almost overnight – it made the hiring decision very difficult!”
Outlining the void in the market, brought about by a combination of other wholesale furniture agents being forced to close, along with an irregular production on the supply-side, Atlas was poised to fill some gaps, as Atlas’ Director for APAC went on to explain:
“We have acquired 5 new manufacturing partners in 3 countries in order to balance the current booming demand” Peter outlines, going on to say “Manager Zou is the keystone to making sure our internal systems and procedures can deliver such a diversification. We spent the last 6 months upgrading our systems and documentation for this very purpose.”
Steven finished off by explaining: “the absolute cherry on the top is that I already live in the same town as the Atlas Furniture Asia China headquarters, I am fluent in professional English and my MBA enables me to see aspects of the business that a ‘normal’ QC Manager wouldn’t spot. I will be hiring one new QC this month and working with the existing quality team to ensure that containers are shipping at the renowned ‘Atlas Quality’ level and on-time.”
New Members of Steven Zou’s QA Team
First port of call was for Steven to hire new Quality Control Engineers to assist him with the huge boost in business. He wasted no time hiring from some of the best candidates out there. Meet his new hires:
NEW APPOINTMENT: Smith Qiu – Quality Control
Smith is an expert in change management and working alongside suppliers to squeeze improvements from every corner of the business. He has a keen eye for both identifying errors and finding places for further development in both product design, mass production, packing and the inspection process itself. He has over 15 years of experience in the Chinese furniture manufacturing space.
NEW APPOINTMENT: Mac Long – Quality Control
Mac has been on both sides of the battle for quality – being both a full production manager, as well as a long-serving QC. He understands, deeply, the challenges facing factories as they strive to maximise profits, whilst meeting the ever-increasing quality standards from customers. He also understands that Atlas has a responsibility to our wholesalers to never stop pushing for the very best in quality and safety, whilst challenging the bottom-line costs to bring the very best value to all.
NEW APPOINTMENT: Mark Yin – Quality Control
Mark has over 10 years in the furniture industry, serving multi-national manufacturers, as well as industry-leading agents such as Atlas Furniture Asia.
He joins Steven’s team in Shenzhen but travels between many of our manufacturing partner facilities.
New Members of Atlas Vietnam Quality Team
As our business in indoor products increases for wooden beds and bedroom furniture, our presence in Vietnam grows. Our new Head of Vietnam has appointed 2 new Quality staff to be “boots on the ground” in our Vietnamese manufacturing partner facilities.
NEW APPOINTMENT: Henry Le Thanh – Quality Assurance, Indoor Products, Vietnam
Reporting directly to our Head of Vietnam, Henry joins Atlas after many years in the wood furniture industry in Vietnam. He is overseeing the quality efforts in Vietnam, as well as improving documentation and technical specifications on our Countryside range of wooden products.
NEW APPOINTMENT: Justin Tran – Quality Control, Indoor Products, Vietnam
Justin will report to Henry and is based in Vietnam. He will focus on the daily auditing of orders in our factories, carrying out inspections and submitting to the business development team in Shenzhen, to audit and forward on to our clients.
RETURN TO WORK – Ms. Vivian Deng – Executive Assistant to Mr Brobyn
After a number of months on maternity leave, we are thrilled to welcome Ms. Deng back to her role as Executive Assistant to Mr Brobyn.
During the ‘situation’ Vivi has stepped up to run our China division in Peter and Da’s absence, assisting with finance, legal (as we bring our China wholly-owned company fully on-line), human resources and top-level management, including vital supplier relations.
We would like to congratulate her on the birth of her second child and welcome her back to the company with open arms.