Serving 12 clients in Alberta, and customers throughout Canada and as far away as Europe, Mentor maintains its largest market is in the U.S. – about 70% to 85% of its business, Koebel estimates. “We do a fair bit of business in the public transit market, and the U.S. government spends more money on transit than the Canadian government does. So the transit properties in the United States have more access to funds to buy technologies to improve their operations and their efficiencies.”
Mentor’s immersion in the public transit industry led to relationships with the Alberta Motor Association, the American Automobile Association and the Canadian Automobile Association, as well as towing companies and, more recently, paratransit (buses for the elderly or passengers with disabilities) and other fixed-route transportation providers.
“Over the years, we’ve focused on [fixed-route and public transportation] because it has been a good market,” says Koebel. “And I hate to say that it’s recession-proof because nothing is, but it’s not as subject to dips in the economy. Public transit is a need and a right.”
The life cycle of a product from idea conception to delivery to customer can be a long one, as each product Mentor develops is required to meet the regulatory requirements of each country in which it will be used.
“If you look at a hardware product versus a software product, the software products we can deliver a lot sooner mainly because… there’s a lot of new challenges bringing new hardware to the market, such as industry approvals, wireless network certifications, building plastic moulds…” explains Koebel. “There’s a lot of time-consuming elements in building a hardware product.”
Competition definitely keeps the ideas fresh. Howell describes a leapfrog effect where a competitor’s product is released while Mentor’s is still in production, allowing Mentor the opportunity to add a new software element that makes the product faster or sleeker. But when Mentor releases its product and the competitor’s is in production, now the competitor has a chance to jump ahead. While competitors provide a benchmark and keep Mentor staff on their toes, “it’d be nice not to have any,” he jokes.
When it comes to getting ahead of the competition, “you’ve got to ask yourself how do we make our own products obsolete before somebody else does,” says Koebel. Maybe that’s the driving ethic behind Mentor Engineering.
Hickle, Stichling and Howell had never planned to build one product and coast on the profits from there. Two decades later, experimenting with new technologies and developing new products, they’ve proven that innovation keeps flowing out of the Mentor idea factory.
“We would be doing it regardless of the competition,” says Howell. “It’s just who we are.” No purple suits required.
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