My grandfather pooled all his resources and established Modern Engineering Works 47 years ago. Since then, my father took over the venture and eventually, during his old age, shifted the responsibility to his three sons. 

Even though I had wanted to finish my education, financial difficulties prompted me to leave after class-9 and join the family business. Despite the sudden change of course in life, I did not feel disheartened. Working with my father and two brothers is certainly rewarding as we are there to support each other through any struggle. As the proprietor, our father, Md. Ali has always guided us with his wisdom. While my brothers oversee other areas, I work as the director of three of our workshops: Modern Steel Engineering Works, Modern Engineering Workshop, and Abdullah Engineering Workshop.

We focus on producing a range of agricultural machinery for the local market. Our clientele consists of mid-sized farms and businesses that either use our products to make feed for their livestock or provide feed-producing services to small farmers. So we not only help people to sustain their farms but also provide them with a means to earn their livelihood.

Currently, we do not export any goods as we are still at the stage where we are trying to meet the needs of the local customers and also expand our operations to the other areas of Bangladesh. Nonetheless, it is one of our future goals because we believe our products, particularly the chopper machine, is far superior in quality to what is available in the Asian market. If the opportunity arises, we hope to target the Indian market, where there are a lot of farmers and agri-businesses. 

The two-year vision for Modern Engineering Works took a big hit during the Covid crisis. As the pandemic intensified, three of our five workshops had to be temporarily closed, which caused great difficulties in generating cashflows. Even though we were experiencing problems paying rent and salaries, we didn’t want to lay off our employees as they had been working with us for a long time and are very loyal. However, the losses kept us in fear of losing our hard-earned family enterprise. Fortunately, the workshops that were still operating somehow kept our business afloat. And over time, we managed to gather enough orders and reopen all our factories.

I got acquainted with LightCastle Partners after they visited our factory to provide us with training, business development, and marketing support. By collaborating with them and the B-SkillFUL program, we learned how to improve our strategies and models for greater profits. And so, even though the pandemic has postponed our plans by at least five years, I am still hopeful that we can utilize this newly learned knowledge and achieve great success soon.