There's always one kid in the house who ends up holding the torch while dad fixes something. For most of his childhood, Hadi Sanouree was that kid.
"My father was a self-taught dentist. While other kids went on vacation, he'd make my brothers and me spend our summers in his little lab, to watch him make dentures by hand. He made us all learn how to make teeth. There was nothing in the house he couldn't fix, and we were his little assistants."
His father had a wish to see Hadi in a white coat, carrying the clinic forward. After high school, Hadi realized he neither had the patience to memorize biology nor the stomach for it. Physics and Math were the only things he was naturally drawn to because they were logical. With very little faith from the people around him, he ditched dentistry and pursued engineering instead. Before his final year ended, Hadi took up an internship through a friend's reference. He started from the very bottom like writing letters to ministries and doing paperworks. He did it well enough to be asked to stay as a full time employee. So he continued the job alongside his final year and scored the highest across his semesters. Post his degree, he continued working at the same place as a sales manager.
"I trained myself to be a commercial guy because I saw there were people in their 50s and over, working in the company, taking a salary but still just employees. I was 23 and told myself - by the time I'm 30, I'm going to have my own company."
In one random turn of events in Hadi's life, he was supposed to accompany his senior to Switzerland to close a deal with a multibillion-dollar company. Barely five hours before departure, his senior informed him he could no longer travel and Hadi was expected to represent the company alone before executives he had never met.
"I almost backed out. I couldn't imagine walking into that room by myself." But what choice did he have? "I remember the whole flight I was terrified and numb. Though whatever happened after that was worth every nerve."
He came back bathed in joy with the signed deal. His senior introduced him to everyone as the 23-year-old who had just closed a seven-figure deal . “I was proud to realize I could operate purchase, sales, CRM all on my own. I just needed to build capital now." So, after four years of learning all he could from this company, he put down his papers with a fire to start his own journey. His senior too, fanned his fire and sent him off.
Hadi at Frappeverse Middle East His first agency was Nano Solutions, a franchise of a German trading company that he launched together with his business partners. They distribute technical chemicals, construction equipment, safety gear, and enterprise software solutions. After almost 10 years of stitching it together, a familiar feeling of being trapped returned to Hadi.
"I felt like an employee in this franchise at times because we were given targets and instructions. I saw the pattern and decided otherwise. If they can start a company and have franchises, I can have mine too. I tried foreseeing the business and I knew I'd need an ERP to meet the growing needs to track the money and resources. The first thing that popped up when I searched on google was Odoo. We got on the boat. A little after the good speed implementation, we hit the tunnel from where I had to keep paying more to continue the sail. Despite this, we stayed with Odoo for almost a year. My sales people were blaming the software for not getting good reports. I knew this was causing more loss to my business and with time would burn all our savings. I researched to find a way out and found ERPNext. It blew my mind with how much of an underdog ERP it is."
He hired a consultant for implementation help and set a timeline of 10 days. “We sat from morning 10 am till the next morning 3 am. I placed a bet that if we are able to migrate all data from Odoo to ERPNext safely without any damage, we will start a business with ERPNext.”
Visit to Frappeverse Middle East The more Hadi and his partner scratched ERPNext, the more he saw the gaps it could fill like no one else. He sat on the idea and founded Smart Scientific Systems, a dedicated ERPNext implementation service in Iraq in 2021. "Odoo couldn’t take us where we wanted to reach." Hadi adds candidly. "The vanilla version of ERPNext is heaven for any business." Every business they walked into had a different name on the door but the same spreadsheet failing to hold everything well.
“The first level customization like workflows, custom fields were hacks we were not used to in Odoo. A very small change in these customizations can flip the business upside down, it’s so powerful and easy to use.”
Necessity is a cruel teacher. An early business crisis left Hadi alone with two very new team members, barely out of the nest. “I had global names from retails and distributions depending on me. I had to fulfil their requirements or watch the whole setup collapse." With very little time to think, Hadi took matters into his own hands and reached out to Frappe got certified, and implemented ERPNext across every pending project himself. “The ERP implementation service success rate is about 60-65% in worldwide. In our case, by plenty of grace, its 95%.”
Today, Smart Scientific Systems has completed more than 65 ERPNext implementations across Iraq and Jordan, but Hadi is quick to point out that no milestone belongs to him alone. He loves talking about the 11 people he gets to share his coffee with every day at the office.
"Baydaa and Khalid have been with me since day one. We pretty much figured everything out together before building it from scratch. Abdul Aziz and Mahmoud are the ones who keep our clients happy and projects on track. Ahmad and Abdulmunem lead the development team and easily make even the most complicated requirements work. And Safa keeps the finances in order so the rest of us can focus on what we do best. They're family more than colleagues. Once somebody gets in, they barely get out."
3S Team in Iraq If you ask Hadi who 3S works with, the easier answer would be who they don't. They serve everyone from Samsung and Apple distributors to pharmaceutical companies, manufacturers, oil and gas contractors, and retail chains across Iraq and Jordan. As a Frappe certified bronze partner, Hadi is honest about how challenging this road has been. “It’s more psychology than technicality. But once you put down your head and realize you’re creating value to this society, it takes away all the weight of it.”
Hadi hopes to build the most trusted ERPNext partner in the region but never at the cost of the people and principles that got him this far. Long before having a team, there was and is a loving family that makes him see the best in himself and remains his pillar every day. And if you look close enough, it feels fitting for someone who grew up never putting the torch down.
