This will entail relocating stores, reducing floor space in some cases, closing or opening new stores.
The first step has already been taken, Dinu said, by separating the company that handles online sales, Digistore, from the rest of Domo.
“In the first year [of my term in office] the EBITDA has to be positive. This is where we have to work because the main tasks will have to do with optimization of the traditional retail business, which means relocation, downsizing (reducing floor areas i.e.), closing and opening [stores],” said Dinu on ZF Live.
He started his three-year term at the helm of the company, the second largest retailer in its line of business, according to 2011 data, in February after having been given a seat in the board of directors last November.
Lorand Szarvadi, Domo founder and former CEO stayed on as chairman of the board of directors.
Before joining Domo, Dinu had worked as a business consultant for the healthcare industry and prior to that as CEO of A&D Pharma, the largest local pharmaceutical group.
Dinu says he chose Domo because electrical and computer retail is such a dynamic and competitive business that anyone would want to be a part of it.
“The challenge is being in such an industry when it changes. I found here a transition between mortar-and-brick and online, as well as hypermarkets and do-it-yourself retailers selling similar products, and small specialist stores like GSM (cell phone and accessory) retailers also carrying computer products,” Dinu said.
His target is to improve the shape the company is in so as to achieve flexibility in its operations over the coming years.
Domo’s online sales stood at more than EUR12 million out of the over EUR100 million total in 2012. Dinu did not reveal the exact sales figure, but said online sales should double or triple in the next three or four years.
Domo has about 100 stores, after closing 27 last year and laying off 300 to 400 people.
“We have a 7% to 10% growth forecast compared with 2012, coming from computer, GSM, or smart TV [sales]. The EBITDA part comes from the operating cost optimization,” Dinu said.
The first positive sign came at the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013 when sales in installments picked up a bit, Domo’s CEO added.
The electrical and IT retail is estimated at EUR1.4 billion and the top companies are Altex, Domo, Flanco and eMag, all of them founded by Romanians in the last two decades.
(English version by Loredana Fratila-Cristescu)