When Aurel Babic joined the Zlín-based technology company Monet+ more than twenty years ago, it was a small firm of thirty-five people. Today, it is the Company of the Year 2025, with more than three hundred employees. As a long-time account manager and salesperson, Aurel has been present at the most pivotal moments. He has experienced situations where the company nearly lost a key client, handled heart-stopping crises, and negotiated with top-level managers of major corporations.
Aurel, you joined Monet+ at a time when you had already signed a contract elsewhere. You were supposed to be the head of marketing for a large food company. What made you change your plans and join what was then an unknown Zlín IT firm?
I had never heard of the company in my life. Monet+ reached out to me because they were looking for someone for the sales team and were intrigued by the fact that I speak Hungarian. Since I wasn’t supposed to start my other job for a while, I went to the interview purely out of curiosity. One of the owners, Břeťa Endrys, and the sales director at the time, Jirka Beneš, were there. I was very pleasantly surprised by how wonderfully and with what passion they spoke about what Monet+ does, who their clients were, and what they expected from a salesperson. During that interview, I got the feeling that this was a very interesting and promising company. I had been to many interviews while job hunting, but this was such a revelation that I decided to accept their offer and turn down the already-secured marketing head position.
How did an IT firm of 35 people function at the beginning of the millennium? Was it that classic “garage” or “punk” atmosphere?
It was a serious company with a hierarchy, but from today’s perspective, it was almost quaint. Everything—absolutely everything—was planned in Excel. Sales plans, annual budgets, everything ran through spreadsheets. The owner, Břeťa Endrys, wanted control over everything back then. No customer presentation went out without him having it presented internally and approving it first. It fascinated me that a tiny company from Zlín was already dealing with the directors and top management of giant multinational corporations and banks.
Your very first big client brought quite a bit of drama, though. Word has it the first meeting didn’t exactly go according to plan…
That was my ultimate baptism by fire—one of the first meetings with a major client. This specific customer accounted for a significant portion of our revenue and was just undergoing a merger with a large international group. We arrived with a prepared presentation of new services and development plans, but right at the start of the meeting, we got a cold shower. They told us: “You don’t need to present anything. A decision came down from the new foreign owner that our systems must be migrated to a different international authorization center, so we will no longer need your services.”
That must have been a shock for a salesperson. How did you react?
It was my big, key customer—the primary reason I was hired. We were driving back, sitting in the car sitting in the car feeling completely down in the dumps, thinking: “What are we going to do? How do we tell management?” If that client left, it would have been a massive blow to Monet+. The head of developers, Radim Švehlík, was in the car with me, and he had Aleš Popelka on the phone searching for a solution. It looked hopeless, but we didn’t want to give up at any cost. On the way back, they finally came up with a brilliant idea—a “switch,” which we called “Front Office” at the time. I still remember Radim sketching the solution on a restaurant receipt from a gas station.
What did that mean in practice?
The idea was simple and absolutely brilliant. Instead of the client having to replace all terminals across the board and connect them to a new host system, we offered to place our switch between the terminal and that new host system. This switch would re-encrypt transactions in real-time with the key of the new host system. Neither the terminal nor the keys inside it had to be changed. After re-encryption, the switch sent the transactions to the new host system. The customer saved hundreds of thousands by not having to replace terminals. We came to the next meeting—the one where we were supposed to discuss the timeline for ending our cooperation—with this solution. We fought for it, explained the principle and the benefits. After our presentation, the customer said: “Ah, that could work.” It wasn’t entirely easy, but thanks to this solution, we kept the customer. This idea born from a crisis then became a product that essentially functions to this day.
You are a salesperson, but you sold highly sophisticated technological and cryptographic solutions. How hard was it to understand the code and explain it to clients?
I always functioned as the “buffer.” The technical side of Monet+ had a tendency to describe things in an incredibly complex way. I always told the development guys: “Write a ‘warm word’ for me.” By that, I meant something human—something I could understand, extract the essence from, and explain to the customer. At that time, we weren’t delivering products to customers; we were delivering solutions. Our advantage was that we could quickly offer a proposed solution for their ideas and problems, which made us an interesting partner for them.
In IT, things occasionally go wrong. Have you ever experienced a truly “heart-stopping” situation?
I have, and more than once. We were just at a conference abroad when a client called saying there was a massive disaster. They discovered that due to a technical error on the terminals, millions were sent from one merchant’s account instead of the usual tens of thousands. When I think back on it, I still turn pale. We didn’t know immediately if it was a widespread error. Imagine if our solution “accidentally” sent merchants millions instead of tens or hundreds of thousands. Fortunately, after complex detective work in the databases, it was discovered that the customer was using the device in a very non-standard way, which caused a memory buffer overflow in the terminal and shifted the decimal point. Of course, the customer returned the money, a corrective solution was implemented, but I wouldn’t wish those nerves on anyone. Customers often do things with our solutions that no tester would ever think of.
How did Monet+ handle such problems in front of the client? Did you try to sweep it under the rug?
Not at all. Never. My golden rule has always been: proactivity. It is much better to go to the customer yourself and say: “We have a problem and we’re already fixing it,” than to wait for them to find out themselves and call angrily saying: “We have a problem, what are you going to do about it?” When you admit the problem first, the customer sees you as a true partner who doesn’t dodge or stall.
When do you think Monet+ definitively stopped being “that little firm from Zlín” and became a major league player?
It was around 2005, when we secured the project for electronic biometric passports for the State Printing Works of Securities. We entered the big leagues. Suddenly, you’re dealing with the Director of the State Printing Works, high-ranking officials from the Ministry of the Interior, and major integrators—and they treat you as a completely equal partner. Internally, you have to create project structures, handle third-party deliveries, process extensive documentation, project outputs, demanding acceptance processes, and internal audits. That consumes and changes the entire company if you want to succeed.
Did that have a downside?
Success required sacrifices. Due to the massive commitment to this project, the company simply lacked capacity elsewhere and had to withdraw from another significant project for a major national carrier with a heavy heart. We had poured a mountain of energy and time into the preparation, participated in dozens of meetings and presentations, conducted analyses, and prepared a proposal—but in the end, we had to back out. In times of extreme growth, it simply wasn’t possible to realize everything. It bothered me for a long time, and to this day, whenever I come across that product’s logo, I regret that we didn’t hop on that train back then.
Today, Monet+ has over 300 people. What were the biggest milestones that internally changed the way the company functions?
I see two huge turning points. The first occurred when we crossed roughly 150 people. At that point, the company simply couldn’t be managed via Excel spreadsheets, and one person could no longer keep everything in their head. Suddenly, you can’t remember the names and faces of all your colleagues or know what everyone is doing. Processes had to be introduced and competencies divided. The second huge turning point was COVID. The entire traditional business—traveling to see customers, meeting in person—moved to the online world overnight. Presentations and meetings had to be done completely differently, and in my opinion, that changed the operation of the company and sales quite fundamentally.
Looking back over those twenty-plus years, Monet+ is celebrating 30 years this year, and you’ve spent a huge part of your career here. Plus, the company won the prestigious Company of the Year 2025 title last year. What do you think is the main “magic” that makes it all work so successfully for so long? What would you wish for the company in the years to come?
The main magic has always been in our approach. Historically, we never just sold “boxed” products; we always delivered solutions to our customers. They had a problem, and we were able to come in and solve it. Even now, when we deliver products and services, we are still able to develop our solutions according to the customer’s wishes. And hand in hand with that went the aforementioned fairness and proactivity—we never hid problems from clients under the rug and treated them like true partners. The Company of the Year 2025 award is a huge validation for us and proof that this approach works.
For the coming years, I would wish for the company to maintain its healthy common sense and drive, despite its current size, necessary processes, and the online era. And above all, may there always be room for that proverbial “warm word” within our complex technology and code, so that we continue to understand our customers on a human level.
