CML Acquires Jiangyou Starteam Electronics Technology Co., Ltd

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CML has made a strategic decision to acquire Starteam, a manufacturer for printed circuit boards in China, Sichuan province. Since 2018, Starteam has been under CML management and we are pleased to announce that the transition was successfully completed in May 2020. During this period Starteam became a German PCB manufacturer in China.

To date, CML is located across 17 cities worldwide. Since 2001, CML has been driven by the demanding quality standards of the automotive industry supply chain. Our unwavering dedication and commitment to be a reliable customer centric partner to delivering best-in-class PCBs solutions has made us one of the global leaders in PCB sourcing and supply.

Over the past 2 years, CML has invested an abundance of resources into Starteam. CML deployed PCB experts to the factory, investments into machines and $2.5M USD into a new IT infrastructure, connecting them globally within seconds, which has proven beneficial during the Covid-19 pandemic. Now, the move with Starteam will accelerate with phase two expansion plans kicking off. This growth will bring more opportunities and new markets for CML and Starteam as well as our customers.

“With our own factory we are very well positioned in terms of availability of material, flexibility and price competitiveness. Together, we are confident to offer something new to the market, cater to advanced requirements and brings sustainability to every company’s supply chain. In the past, due to technical limitations, CML had a lower percentage of IMS (Aluminum) projects. At Starteam, we have several special machineries (e.g. laser routing) for this kind of product and a team with many years of experience for local and international customers. We plan to grow further in this product segment,” says Daniel Jacob, Managing Director of CML EurAsia.

CML foresees the trend of moving PCBA manufacturing further to China, especially the trend in the new generation of e-cars. CML’s business in the Chinese domestic market business has grown annually and it accounts for more than 10% of our global turnover in 2019. With this growth, the company sees many more opportunities coming in from North and West China and global customers with local assembly sides.

“Considering that global competition will become more challenging and global trade might not be as simple all the time as it was in the past 10 years, we believe Starteam was the missing piece of the puzzle in our picture. There is a big strategic benefit for our customers in Europe and the US to work with a partner like CML. We are proud to be the first PCB company with origin in Germany being able to establish successfully an own factory in China,” says Daniel Jacob, Managing Director of CML EurAsia.

“All of our stakeholders understand our ambition and we are grateful and proud of the long-term relationships we have established over the years. Together with all our long – term reliable manufacturing partners, customers and teams we will keep growing in the coming years. Starteam is already an important pillar in our organization and will be a very important differentiator for us in future,” says Moritz Hoeft, Managing Director of CML Europe.