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1 2 Startups: Being There at the Beginning Publication Date: 8/12/2010 By Andy Marken, Marken Communications, Santa Clara, CA Get in on the ground floor, put in a rough year or two and retire a millionaire. It's the American Dream, and has happened quite often — especially during Silicon Valley's heyday and the dot com boom. But today? There are many come-ons, and many of them are bona fide. You've heard them all before ... eKanban Comes of Age Publication Date: 6/30/2010 By Bill Metallo, Vice President, Seeburger, Inc., Atlanta, GA and James Hatcher, Managing Director, Seeburger Asia Pacific, Tokyo For years, eKanban has been touted as a lean manufacturing strategy capable of automating parts consumption tracking and replenishment, but most of the talk has been as empty as a consumed kanban bin. Tracking material flow in real time by electronic signal (electronic kanban) rather than by hand ... Six Levels of Customer Engagement Publication Date: 6/2/2010 By Dan Adams, President, Advanced Industrial Marketing, Inc., Cuyahoga Falls, OH Is your company a great innovator? It's a tricky question. If you interrogate your sales team a couple of times a year, then bombard the marketplace with new "solutions" to customer problems, you might assume the answer is yes. After all, you are giving your company's product developers a real workout ... Austin's Clean Energy Venture Fosters Debate About Utilities Publication Date: 4/1/2010 By Wendy Prabhu, President, Mercom Capital Group, Austin, TX For two days, deal-makers, utilities and emerging clean energy technology companies from across the U.S. converged at Austin's third-annual Clean Energy Venture Summit (CEVS) to share ideas about advancing the smart grid, compete for funding and vie for a chance to participate in the Pecan Street Project ... Saving Capital and Costs with Test Equipment Rental Publication Date: 1/4/2010 By Tessa Lowrey, Marketing, Advanced Test Equipment Rentals, San Diego, CA In a struggling economy, budgets are being trimmed more than ever. As today's business environment becomes ever more competitive, the bottom line becomes the measurement of success. Companies are expected to produce more results with fewer resources; therefore every dollar must be carefully spent ... Competitive Analysis Supercharges Marketing Publication Date: 11/25/2009 By Jim McMahon, President, Zebra Communications, Simi Valley, CA Better focused positioning, increased market share, more qualified leads and reduced cost of marketing — these are some of the benefits that competitive analysis, when used in PR, can bring to industrial and high-tech companies. It's Not "Just a Circuit Breaker" Publication Date: 10/23/2009 By Michael Manning, VP of Engineering, Automation Systems Interconnect, Inc., Mechanicsburg, PA Most design engineers think of a circuit breaker as a low cost commodity component that usually doesn't get much attention when designing a new piece of equipment or system. In fact, on many occasions I have heard someone say, "It doesn't matter; I just need a circuit breaker." The fact of the matter ... Develop the Right Online Strategy for Recovery Publication Date: 10/8/2009 By Susan Orr, Senior Director, Strategic Marketing, ThomasNet, New York, NY It's no secret that the recession has taken a toll on the industrial and manufacturing sectors, but slowly, many companies appear to be emerging from the worst of it. Now, every day, we are hearing evidence of a gradual economic upswing, and your peers are becoming part of a new voice of optimism ... Innovative Designs Help Customer Sputter Better Publication Date: 7/2/2009 By Bill Meredith, VP & General Manager, Sputtering Components Inc., Owatonna, MN To stay ahead of the competition, a major U.S. glass-coating company wanted to increase yield without sacrificing quality. They had ideas about how to improve their coating tool, but needed the large assembly to be designed and built quickly. Their search for a development partner led them to Sputtering Components Inc. (SCI). SCI is a high-volume manufacturer of rotary cathodes and components for the physical vapor deposition (PVD) industry. Based in Owatonna, Minnesota, the company produces tools used for sputtering — the process by which ultra thin layers of material are deposited onto a substrate. Applications for PVD thin films range from microelectronics and optical assemblies to food packaging and window... Calculating Cost of Ownership for Dispensing Equipment Publication Date: 6/2/2009 By Dan Ashley, Market Specialist, Printed Circuit Board Assembly, Asymtek, Carlsbad, CA It's not news that electronics manufacturers are looking for ways to reduce manufacturing costs. Saving money on the purchase of capital equipment, which is a major component of overall manufacturing costs, seems like a good solution. However, selecting equipment based on the price of the equipment ... Patent Holder Beware: Quanta's Impact on Licensing Publication Date: 4/27/2009 By Michael F. Hurley, Partner, McDermott Will & Emery LLP, New York, NY Patents count among any company's most valuable business assets in today's global economy. However, many global business players contend that patent holders too often attempt to use their rights to stifle innovation and competition, and the U.S. Supreme Court seems increasingly inclined to side with ... Ending the Manufacturing Recession Publication Date: 2/9/2009 By Dr. Chris Kuehl, Economic Analyst, Fabricators & Manufacturers Association International, Rockford, IL Few of us will miss 2008. It was one of the most tumultuous of economic years. Let's instead focus on the prospects for 2009 and the possible reversal of economic fortune. The key to forecasting for an economist is to plant as many caveats as possible, so that when the prediction doesn't quite pan ... Financing and Market Opportunities Publication Date: 12/11/2008 By Jeffrey Servin & George Stasen, Arcadia Capital Partners, West Chester, PA Surprise: common stocks are risky. But the stock market is necessary for the survival of a free market system. Without a stock market, financing economic growth is problematic. Private companies have three mechanisms for funding growth — reinvest profit, borrow from lenders or sell stock to a limited ... Export Market Expands Even as Dollar Recovers Publication Date: 10/31/2008 By Dr. Chris Kuehl, Economic Analyst, Fabricators & Manufacturers Association, International, Rockford, IL & Managing Partner, Armada Corporate Intelligence, Kansas City, MO For the past several months the one bright spot for the U.S. economy has been the export sector. New records have been set in exporting every month for over two years now and the U.S. has even managed to make some inroads on its trade deficit. The reason for all this activity has been pretty obvious — a weaker dollar. This weak dollar has meant that virtually all U.S. goods are being sold overseas at a 30 percent discount. This has helped U.S. manufacturers get past high tariff barriers, consumer resistance and competition to build volume in foreign sales... Overcoming Risk in the Service Supply Chain Publication Date: 10/1/2008 By Mike Landry, Founder and CTO, Servigistics, Atlanta, GA According to the 2008 Duke University/CFO Magazine Global Business Outlook survey, which asked more than 1,000 CFOs about their expectations for the economy, optimism among chief financial officers reached its lowest point since the optimism index launched over six years ago. Add rising fuel prices, increasing unemployment and significant cuts in consumer spending, and it's no wonder that CFOs are pessimistic about current economic conditions. Doing business under current conditions is risky business. One of the areas evoking the most concern over risk management is in the supply chain. Significant supply chain disruptions can reduce a company's revenue, cut into market share, inflate costs, tap out the budget and threaten production and distribution, according to property insurer FM Global in a report on risk management in a global economy. A companion study of more than 600 financial executives found that supply chain risk, more than anything else, had the greatest potential to disrupt their top revenue drivers.   Taking the Sting Out of Warranty Costs Publication Date: 8/20/2008 By Chris Rehl, Director of Marketing, Cimtek, Needham, MA It's a big nightmare for electronics manufacturers: A sure-bet product — with years of development pumped in — is delivered with great fanfare and ringing cash registers. Two months later, a glitch affecting overall system performance is discovered in a few of these systems. The number grows and weeks later, thousands of products await repair or replacement. The media will have a field day, making news about the shoddy state of manufacturing and calling the manufacturer to task for poor customer service. It's publicity for sure, and surely not the kind that most companies would want. The costs are spiraling out of control. Suddenly, the product that was supposed to make millions puts a big red mark on the balance sheet.   Internships & Apprenticeships Win-Win Manufacturers Publication Date: 7/22/2008 By Jim Warren, Director of Education, Fabricators & Manufacturers Association, International, Rockford, IL Manufacturers in the U.S., regardless of size, specialty or location, are reporting a dire shortage of skilled workers such as welders, fabricators, laser operators, electricians, press brake operators and machinists. A survey of FMA members conducted in 2007 revealed the biggest challenge they face is the dwindling supply of skilled workers, cited by some 40 percent of those polled, far surpassing other concerns. The annual talent shortage survey by Manpower, Inc. of the 10 most difficult jobs to fill corroborates the FMA finding. The poll states that engineers, machinists, and skilled trade workers are the three positions most challenging to fill in 2008. Adapting for Success in the PCB Industry Publication Date: 6/10/2008 By Terry Heilman, CEO, Sunstone Circuits, Mulino, OR Like many other industries, the North American printed circuit board (PCB) industry has been unable to maintain immunity from the effects of rapid globalization. Overseas competition contributed to a rapid decline in the number of domestic PCB manufacturing facilities, from an estimated 890 just five years ago to fewer than 400 today. Customers with long lead-time, high-volume products have moved production overseas, where producers offer attractive cost savings. Pre-Owned SMT Feeders: Cost-Effective Options Publication Date: 6/10/2008 By Melissa Bergeron, Manufacturing and Feeder Division Manager, Lewis and Clark, Inc., Nashua, NH Obtaining the correct types and quantity of feeders with pre-owned SMT equipment is just not in the cards. Invariably, buyers almost always end up with feeders they don't need or shortages of the ones they do need. To make up for the shortages the only option that had been available was to purchase feeders from the OEM. The result: end-users often have found themselves stockpiling feeders with no foreseeable requirement. After all, what's the likelihood of purchasing a pre-owned system and ending up with exactly the feeders needed in the correct quantities? Probably better than winning the lottery, but still not in your favor. Resellers soon realized feeders really had their own sub-market and considerable activity began to take place with the buying, selling and trading of pre-owned feeders. I&J Fisnar France: Making it all Work Publication Date: 6/10/2008 Loic le Naou and Helene Aubry confer on a product shipping order. By Walter Salm Cergy-Pontoise, France — What? Translate the entire I&J Fisnar catalog, data sheets and engineering bulletins from English into French? Who on earth would willingly take on a task like that? The answer: Loic le Naou, the president of I&J Fisnar France S.A. Located in a northwestern suburb of Paris, the company provides complete technical and engineering support for its products. The French subsidiary started out in 1990 with just 2 employees; Loic was one of them, and he has been leading the company's French operation ever since.