Control Network Newsletter
New Manufacturing Equipment Improve Made in America Production Capability
June 2016 - Customers that visit us are surprised to see that we manufacturer our own products - either in our Suzhou, China plant or in our headquarters' Downers Grove plant. With self-manufacturing we can control our quality, juggle our production schedule to meet demand, and reduce our manufacturing costs in order to best serve our customers.
A couple months ago we announced the arrival of two new manufacturing machines at our Downers Grove, Illinois headquarters. We are pleased to announce that the new Panasonic AM100 modular, single-beam placement machine, and Panasonic SPP, screen printing machine are up and running smoothly.
Besides the machines being much faster, more precise, and more versatile, they allow Contemporary Controls to expand its production of Made in America and North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) qualified goods. Recently, we have received more requests for North American manufactured products in order to comply with provisions in contract documents. We are now in a better position to meet these needs.
Renee Lucente, Manufacturing Supervisor and Production Specialist at Contemporary Controls, stated, "The new machines offer a greater component diversification along with an increased precision and efficiency. That in turn enables us to expand our product design capabilities, reduce lead times and remain competitive - while giving us the ability to better comply with Made in America and NAFTA requirements."
Additionally, the improved efficiency provided by both machines has helped decrease time to market for devices manufactured at Contemporary Controls' Downers Grove headquarters. While the machines help decrease the production time of current devices, they also help decrease future products time to market by decreasing prototype build time.
Installing new equipment and resuming normal production cycles does not come without effort.
"The installation and utilization of the new equipment forced us to reevaluate and verify the production of all products," stated Lucente. "This has enabled us to confirm the accuracy of not only our processes but our build specifications and documentation."