Forty-two years of bearings out of Dubai
Mineral Circles Bearings started in 1984 as a bearing export company in Dubai. Today it supplies the automotive aftermarket and industrial maintenance customers across the GCC, Africa and export markets from a 10,000 m² warehouse in Jebel Ali Free Zone, with a showroom in Deira and more than 50,000 part numbers on the shelf.
The range covers NSK, NTN-SNR and SKF alongside the company's own MCB brand: bearings, seals, CV joints, hub kits, belts and lubricants. Everything runs on NetSuite, from the catalog of about 80,000 part numbers to the 12,400 customer accounts spread over more than 150 countries.
| Founded | 1984, Dubai |
|---|---|
| Headquarters | Jebel Ali Free Zone, 10,000 m² warehouse |
| Team | 50+ people, 15+ nationalities |
| Catalog | About 80,000 part numbers |
| Customers | About 12,400 accounts in more than 150 countries |
| Quotes | About 1,000 a month, 15,000 quote lines |
| Orders | About 650 a month |
| Currencies | AED and USD |
| System of record | Oracle NetSuite |
A discount matrix nobody trusted
MCB writes about 1,000 quotes a month, around 15,000 quote lines, in AED and USD. Prices came from a list, a customer discount band and whatever the rep felt the deal needed. The same bearing could go out at four different prices to similar workshops in the same week.
Finance could see margin slipping but not where. The pricing manager spent two days a month rebuilding the matrix in a spreadsheet.
Reps repriced in place, so the history was gone
Most quotes were edited after they were first saved. Reps changed prices on the NetSuite estimate itself, so the price a customer first saw, and the one they pushed back on, were never recorded. Roughly half of all quotes converted to orders, with no record of which price won.
Demand was seasonal per part but flat in total. Some part numbers sell most of their year in three months, yet the list price never moved with stock pressure. That was the first signal Elastly learned to use.
Two years of quotes, one shadow month
Elastly connected to NetSuite and imported two years of quotes, about 350,000 quote lines, together with orders, cost and stock. The pricing team set a 22% margin floor, an 8% ceiling over list and approval for any discount over 12%.
For April, Elastly priced every new estimate in the background while reps worked as usual. The team compared the two each week. In May, writeback went live for the Jebel Ali warehouse, and for every location in June.
Smaller discounts where they were not needed
Gross margin moved from 21.4% to 24.2% by October. Win rate on quotes stayed within half a point of the previous year. Most of the gain came from long-tail part numbers and smaller workshop orders, where reps had been giving the full band discount by habit.
Reps now accept 97% of Elastly prices without editing them. The monthly matrix rebuild no longer exists.
“The reps trust it because it shows its working. When a customer pushes back, they can say exactly why the price is the price.”Hassanein Alwan, Managing Director, Mineral Circles Bearings