goingplacesmagazine.com
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30
| August 2019Leaving
On A Hıgh
Mark Raine leaves a successful legacy – not just for
Mercedes-Benz Malaysia but for the Malaysian luxury
car segment – to take on new challenges in one of the
automaker’s top five markets in the world, Korea.
Interview Julie Goh | Photography courtesy of Mercedes-Benz Malaysia
IN PROFILE | Mark Raine
Tell us a bit about yourself. Where are
you from?
I was born in Berlin in Germany, but I grew up in
South Africa. My mother is German and my dad
is from the U.K. I have been with Mercedes-Benz
since 2002.
Before Mercedes-Benz Malaysia, where
were you?
I started with Mercedes-Benz. I was lucky to
receive a scholarship from Mercedes-Benz for
my studies. I joined the company upon my
graduation. My first job was in sales in Stuttgart.
After that, I moved to Dubai to be in charge of
sales and product management for the Middle
East region for three and a half years. I was
recalled to Stuttgart to become the global
executive assistant to one of the senior board
members of Mercedes-Benz, and for the last
four and a half years, I have been in Malaysia.
And how have the four and a half
years been?
It has been fantastic. Personally, I have grown
and learnt a lot in Malaysia. Privately, it has
been wonderful. My family loves it here and
my son was born in Malaysia. Professionally, it
has been a fantastic journey, especially looking
at the transformation of the (Mercedes-Benz)
brand in the last four and a half years. It has
been an exceptional journey for the brand as
we have made a real impact. I have always
said, I probably give a lot of the impulses but
it is the team that has done a fantastic job.
What is crucially important – and this is also
my philosophy – is to always integrate the
stakeholders. Obviously, the core stakeholder
is the customer but our dealers and agencies,
the government and our media and creative
partners, are also important. Our dealers play
a huge part because they are our face to the
customer. Aligning our strategy with theirs is
absolutely essential and important in making
the brand a success because they question
us critically. But in the end, we align and we
execute together and that’s probably our
success factor.
Your positivity is obviously very infectious,
and I think it has also rubbed off on
Mercedes-Benz Malaysia because we’ve
seen a tremendous jump in the ownership
of the cars since you took up this position.
How do you determine what sells in
Malaysia? What has been the company’s
strategy that has propelled it to the top of
the premium car segment?
What I did when I came here was for the first
couple of months, I did a detailed analysis
of the situation to see where the potentials
were, where we need to become better, where
our strengths and our businesses were, and I
created a strategic roadmap for Mercedes-Benz
in Malaysia. The roadmap exists till this day, but
we enhance and revise it on a quarterly basis.
This means we discuss it internally and with the
dealers. We integrate everybody’s views, and
finally, we inform everyone what the direction is,
and that has been very successful for us.
Is that how you determine what sells
in Malaysia?
Our market analysis is based on various
pillars. On one hand, the product portfolio, on
the other, the brand perception or the image,
utilising the strengths of the brand, including
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