As an honest, courteous, patient, responsible and optimistic person, the Latin American security industry remembers engineer Jaime Oliva Reyes, president of the ALAS Mexico chapter and ASIS Mexico, who passed away last May.by Ana María Restrepo
Before turning 25 and graduating as a communications and electronics engineer, Jaime Oliva Reyes sold and distributed shoes, but dissatisfied with that activity, which did not meet his professional expectations, he created a repair shop for radio and television equipment that brought him closer to his studies and taught him how to implement strategies of marketing and public relations.
The drive of this Mexican never fainted over the years, his son Jaime Oliva Garduño remembers him as a good father, who always instilled in his children values such as honesty and responsibility, in addition to teaching them that the things they want are achieved with effort.
As for the professional part and within the Sonic Group, Oliva Reyes not only cared about selling a system, but also sought that it met the expectations of customers and met their needs.
And it is that this engineer with the experience that give the years and the profession, knew that a security system must adapt to the consumer and not the user to the system.
Your beginnings in security
In 1964, this young professional received his engineering degree and began working as a Service Technician at Philips Mexicana S.A, then ascending as head of the Electroacoustic Projects Department and, ending in 1975, in the Product Management of Professional Equipment.
Oliva Reyes was born into a merchant family as the youngest of five children and perhaps his parents' skills and professional heritage, along with the knowledge gained in CCTV design and implementation, helped him become the first introducer of CCTV equipment in Mexico.
After his retirement from Philips, Jaime began to carve his way as an independent distributing sound equipment, and then became the main distributor of such equipment in the Mexican Republic.
In 1976 he founded the Mexican company Sonic, which due to an economic situation entered the security industry. The current Sonic Group began as a company specializing in audio, but in 1977 the opportunity presented itself to introduce CCTV equipment at very affordable prices for surveillance.
Over the years Sonic was gaining strength in the security industry in Mexico and introduced new international brands with which good winds came for the company and for the sector in this country.
Humberto de la Vega, vice president of sales for Latin America and the Caribbean of HID Corporation, remembers that the day he met Jaime Oliva Sonic was performing a CCTV equipment in high security seclusion facilities. "At the beginning of the nineties I met Oliva Reyes. I joined the Patrimonial Security group that existed within the Chamber of Commerce of Mexico City. In my first meeting, the topic was how to face the terrible crisis generated by the devaluation of our currency against the dollar, and that was when the moderator, Mr. Caro del Castillo asked Engineer Jaime Oliva to give his opinion on the matter, since his company had suffered a great blow for this circumstance."
Meanwhile, Brent Douglas, vice president of sales and marketing for Crockett International, recalls that Jaime Oliva was the first person he met in the security industry when he first started at Crockett International in Mexico in 1990. "We had recently been named Gyyr's new sales representative (they manufactured time-lapse VCR), and Sonic Sistemas (the company that Mr. Oliva founded and directed) was Gyyr's largest customer in Latin America at the time.
A professional with a social sense
For Oliva Reyes, the constitution of his own company meant the achievement of one of his many dreams, which began to focus on the development of the security industry and all the professionals, technicians and other people who make it up in Mexico. For him, continuous learning was one of the pillars that formed a good professional, so he supported and stimulated his son Jaime to obtain the CCP certification (Certified Professional Protection), which he also took and approved, however he did not settle for that and got the PSP (Physical Security Professional).
Currently, the Sonic Group, a one hundred percent Mexican company, works in the security and communications sectors, through IP voice solutions, data solutions and electronic security. In recent years Oliva Reyes was the president of the group, and his three children, Jaime, Gustavo and Claudia were at his side assuming the roles that today correspond to them, as presidents of the security and communications divisions and as finance director, respectively.
Another of Jaime's great achievements was to be president of ASIS (American Society for Industrial Security) Mexico chapter and president of ALAS (Latin American Security Association) also in his country. In both institutions Oliva Reyes fought and led the implementation of different trainings, activities that he had also carried out years ago in his company, in order to further professionalize the industry and offer more complete solutions.
"In the 70's or 80's my father introduced new and important brands in Mexico and held technological seminars in order to make people in the security industry more qualified," says Jaime Oliva Garduño.
Security and friendship solutions
In the words of Oliva Reyes, the security guild must not only grow in design, equipment and technology, but also in the quality and technical and academic preparation of its members, in order for security to be considered as a strategy of the organization, include policies and procedures on best practices for keeping critical assets safe across the organization; and thus strengthen each sector where services and products are provided, and the companies providing these services and products.
For Lucy Rivero, director of Corporativo Inalarm S.A, who spent more than 20 years close to the engineer, Oliva Reyes was a tireless professional, dedicated to his family and his business; a man with a high sense of gratitude and correspondence to the industry for how much he gave him, and a leader who became involved in various associations in favor of the professionalism of his colleagues and clients. "During all this time I witnessed the hard work that Jaime did in developing important activities especially towards the Financial Industry. For me he is a great example as well as for all of us who were lucky enough to be close to him."
So does Brent Douglas, who narrates with joy the first time he saw Oliva Reyes. "When I arrived in Mexico City to meet Engineer Oliva, it turned out that Sonic was presenting its annual seminar (that same day), to more than 100 clients in the banking industry. After we were introduced, Oliva asked me if I was ready to do my (two-hour) exhibition that afternoon in a room full of customers from various banks. Being new to the industry and starting to speak Spanish, after 15 years of not having practiced the language, I was a little terrified. However, Engineer Oliva told me the main topics I should cover and told me that he had complete confidence in my abilities. With your help I did the presentation and also the question and answer session. That night, drinking tequila and singing with the mariachis at the Sonic-sponsored party, I decided that if I could survive that day's experience, then I could endure whatever trials and adversities businesses in Mexico had in store for me and my company."
As a professional and friend, Humberto de la Vega remembers Jaime Oliva as a very courteous, serious, respectful, kind person, a gentleman; a father and a husband proud of his family and his children. In the workplace he was clear and concise, a very well prepared professional. But the memory does not end here, because de la Vega mentions that "I had some points of controversy with him when I just left the Presidency of ASIS Chapter Mexico, due to the content of a column that I precisely wrote for VENTAS DE SEGURIDAD; and while the issue was not easy, we really talked about it in a very rational way. That time I met the "Don Jaime leader" that I had not met until that day, and it was really very nice to be able to discuss and reconcile positions and points of view with a character like him."
For the security industry in Mexico Jaime Oliva is one of the most prominent, well-known and remembered characters. "I am very grateful for the help that Engineer Oliva offered me the day I met him and I will always remember him for his professionalism and integrity in the industry. For me, he was the face of electronic security in Mexico," Douglas says.
Leave your comment