-
- News
- Books
Featured Books
- pcb007 Magazine
Latest Issues
Current IssueThe Growing Industry
In this issue of PCB007 Magazine, we talk with leading economic experts, advocacy specialists in Washington, D.C., and PCB company leadership to get a well-rounded picture of what’s happening in the industry today. Don’t miss it.
The Sustainability Issue
Sustainability is one of the most widely used terms in business today, especially for electronics and manufacturing but what does it mean to you? We explore the environmental, business, and economic impacts.
The Fabricator’s Guide to IPC APEX EXPO
This issue previews many of the important events taking place at this year's show and highlights some changes and opportunities. So, buckle up. We are counting down to IPC APEX EXPO 2024.
- Articles
Article Highlights
- Columns
Search Console
- Links
- Events
||| MENU - pcb007 Magazine
Ventec Shares Their Insights on the Laminate Market, Part I
September 12, 2017 | Barry Matties, I-Connect007Estimated reading time: 7 minutes
Goodwin: Bandwidth is more important for us, but we've got more than enough capacity if we run this plant 24 hours a day to cut and ship everything the UK market needs.
Matties: How many people do you have in this factory?
Goodwin: We've got seven on the shop floor and about the same in all the admin, sales desk and management functions and external sales.
Matties: That's a pretty lean team.
Goodwin: Yes, the whole business here now is 16 people including me, but I don't really sit in this business unit anymore. I have Germany and the U.S. reporting to me, so that's been hard letting go of this and letting other people play with my train set; but they do a great job, so I'm pleased with it and it's freed me up to do other things.
Matties: What about turnover?
Goodwin: This year it's going to be somewhere between a seven and eight million-pound turnover for the UK business unit, which would have been a lot more dollars last year than it is this year, which is the currency we report in, and that interests HQ.
Matties: It's good for a visiting American. Pounds are a little bit cheaper right now. So you've been profitable basically from the first few years just growing?
Goodwin: We had some startup losses in the first couple of years, but we've been profitable ever since. We manage our profitability carefully. It’s a combination of margin, volume and mix, and managing costs, so maximizing what we do in China and minimizing what we do in high cost regions whilst maintaining service levels. We offer a very high level of service, very quick delivery to our customers. That means we need bandwidth in a working day, so we have a very high equipment capacity, and we carry extensive inventories, and tightly manage our supply chain out of Suzhou. You can see we've reinvested a lot of the profits in the factory, from all the new plant and equipment on the shop floor—you've seen that briefly, to make sure we can continue to provide a good level of service and a good level of quality to our customers. In fact, globally we have a very clear strategic investment plan to make sure customers in every region can reap the benefits of our fully managed and coordinated supply chain. Mix has also been important in our growth: polyimide, low-flow/no-flow prepregs, all those kind of little specialty products. The IMS business, thermal management, is a huge driver for us in the last two years, but in the last year in particular, we have world leading products in our VT-4B series of IMS.
Matties: What sort of applications are those typically going into?
Goodwin: A lot of high-powered LED lights and automotive car lighting, DC power conversion, and electric power trains, e-motors all these are going to be a big thing.
Matties: And these are growing markets too.
Goodwin: E-vehicles and hybrid vehicles are going to be a huge business for us and we're really well-positioned in those. We're bringing some new products on like the VT-5A2, which are thermally conductive multilayer materials. Basically, it's built around thermally conducted prepregs so we can make thermally conductive laminates and thermally conductive prepregs. You can build up complex multi-layer structures and bond those to an IMS, bond them in hybrid form to other FR-4 type or polyimide type laminate. You only have to have the heat dissipation thermal management where you need it.
Matties: In the area where you need the performance?
Goodwin: Exactly. This is the direction we're heading and we're definitely becoming a world leader in thermal management, and we're becoming a leader in quality, technology and processability of our polyimide products as well. We really have come from nowhere in the polyimide business in five to six years and we have pretty much the UK market and big chunks of the European market. It’s a bit slower in the U.S., but then the U.S. is polyimide central and all our competitors are already there, so it's harder to dislodge the incumbents in the American market than it is here. But we are making steady progress and a have few developments up our sleeve that will accelerate the polyimide business in the USA for us.
Matties: That's a big market, but there's a big play in Asia, right? That's really where the big play is for you guys?
Goodwin: If you look at Ventec's model, we're not small, but we're not one of the really big laminators.
Matties: There's a lot of head room there, though.
Goodwin: Yeah, a lot of head room, but we're more interested in the interesting niches. Again, thermal management being one of those. Polyimide being another. Of course, we also have really good business in standard materials, standard FR-4s, halogen-free FR-4s. We're a high service model in China as well, generally we're not supplying the 200,000, 300,000, 400,000 sheets somebody needs every month. We're supplying the 50,000, or 75,000 sheets, which is still a big number, but we do those within a few days.
Page 2 of 2Suggested Items
Magnachip Celebrates the Grand Opening of Magnachip Technology Company in China
05/16/2024 | MagnachipMagnachip Semiconductor Corporation celebrated the opening ceremony of Magnachip Technology Company, Ltd. (MTC) yesterday at its headquarters located in Hefei, China. MTC is a subsidiary of Magnachip, established on December 20, 2023, to expand the Company’s display driver IC and power IC businesses in China.
Real Time with… IPC APEX EXPO 2024: Saki America's Inspection Solutions and Market Expansion
05/15/2024 | Real Time with...IPC APEX EXPOCraig Brown, GM of Saki America, speaks with Editor Marcy LaRont about Saki's comprehensive inspection solutions, metrology, quality control, and software integration. He also touches on the company's recent X-ray machine award, the 3Di-LS3 machine, and their growing presence in the US and Mexico markets.
Real Time with... IPC APEX EXPO 2024: Electra's Passion for Inkjet Solder Mask Technology
05/15/2024 | Real Time with...IPC APEX EXPODon Monn, national sales manager for Electra Polymers, discusses his transition to Electra and the benefits of inkjet solder mask technology. He emphasizes the significance of product passion and understanding customer issues. Don also outlines Electra's mission and expansion plans, and addresses the current state of the PCB market and the importance of education.
SiPearl: Partnership with Samsung Electronics for built-in HBM in Rhea
05/14/2024 | BUSINESS WIRESiPearl, the company building the high-performance low-power European microprocessor for HPC and AI inference, has signed a partnership with Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., a world leader in advanced memory technology, to equip its Rhea series with Samsung’s advanced memory solution ideal for HPC and AI applications.
LPKF is Ready for Increasing Demand for Glass Substrates in the Semiconductor Industry
05/13/2024 | LPKFThe semiconductor industry is shifting towards glass to package the most advanced semiconductor chips. LPKF’s mature LIDE technology is enabling that transition into this new era from ramp-up to high volume manufacturing.