Your flexible friend

In the competitive world of contract electronics manufacturing, smaller companies can be more responsive to the needs of the customer, says Mark Wilkinson, MD of Copernica.

One of the most competitive sectors in the electronics industry is, without doubt, that of contract electronics manufacturing.

Competitive not just on cost, but on other factors such as speed of response to an enquiry from a potential customer, turnaround time and, of course, quality.

Most larger and therefore more widely known CEMs thrive on long production runs, populating a wide variety of PCBs using lines of sophisticated equipment utilising more expensive consumables.

Any significant change to their production procedure can lead to extra cost and delays and reduced profit for the manufacturer.

Small to medium size runs and even prototyping can therefore be seen as a nuisance.

This has led to some larger CEMs subcontracting out or even passing on work to smaller CEMs, thus bringing benefits to the customer.

It should be said that not every large CEM has this philosophy, as some have dedicated prototyping lines using production equipment that can easily be reconfigured for small to medium runs.

However, they still carry the overheads of a big organisation.

With the smaller CEM flexibility is the key and factors previously mentioned - speed of response, fast turnaround time, cost and quality - are part of their culture.

And they are now benefiting from the overall growth in the electronics manufacturing sector by attracting work both directly and by courtesy of their larger neighbours.

Over the years PCBs have continued to get smaller, leading to increased packing densities.

There are also more ICs per design.

Whereas a circuit typically contained many discrete components, it may have just one specialist IC to carry out multiple functions.

This is all good news for Copernica, a company employing engineers with over 30 years' experience in thick-film hybrid technology, and thus with production geared up for dealing with very compact assemblies and has design and layout capabilities in house, which many other small CEMs do not have.

Also from its hybrid roots, it has full traceability down to component level, as opposed to the situation in some larger companies.

This goes well beyond the requirements of ISO9001:2000 and is proving invaluable with the company's compliance with the RoHS directive.

In contrast to many other small CEMs, functional testing is also offered, again a result of hybrid production.

Since its inception in 1980, Copernica has been involved in the assembly of SMD, through hole and mixed technology boards, from single sided to complex multilayer.

Working from fully procured or free issued kits, the company has the flexibility to handle both prototype and medium production volumes, all backed by comprehensive engineering support.

An illustration of cost savings in production is the in-house screen manufacturing capability, which also reduces turnaround time.

Most manufacturers have to use foils to print the solder paste which cost around GBP 200 for each design iteration.

In contrast, for prototypes and short production runs, Copernica can, if the design allows, make its own solder cream screens for a fraction of the cost.

And these are easily recycled by washing off the pattern and replacing it with a revised layout.

A company involved in the design and manufacture of particulate and opacity monitors is benefiting from Copernica's expertise in this field.

Previously the company was hand soldering every component onto the mixed technology boards, producing its own prototypes, which was very time consuming.

The cost of having this done by a typical CEM was prohibitive and so the company was pointed in the direction of Copernica which, with the cost savings of the in-house screen manufacture, now makes the outsourcing of the prototyping a viable option.

Foils are used for production runs, where their cost is less significant.

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