Two Core Questions

Have you ever found yourself woefully underprepared to tackle a project? I have, more than once. So let me ask two questions...

What is your core skill? What do you outsource?

Industry today is an extremely skill-diverse environment; professionals in industry thrive when they have a diverse network that they can team with. More and more often the technology companies that act like an island can’t adapt to a changing market, can’t innovate, and don’t survive.

For innovators being focused on their core technology is paramount. If you’re a biochemist you’re likely focused on solving a biochemistry problem like stopping Alzheimer’s. If you’re an electrical engineer you’re likely focused on a problem like keeping Moore’s Law on track. Your next wonder drug or processor technology may not happen if you can’t focus on what you're good at. Scaling up your technology and moving to production can be a HUGE distraction.

On average, a complex piece of equipment can be upwards of 15,000 parts.

Say you have a new CVD technology and want to begin production; building in-house means a lot of new infrastructure. On average, a complex piece of equipment can be upwards of 15,000 parts. To build something like that you’ll likely need:

• A buyer team to purchase the parts from the dozens of different manufacturers
• A warehouse to receive the parts and inventory them
• Manufacturing engineering and a quality team to make sure the parts fit together properly
• An assembly team to build out the equipment
• A testing team capable of verifying your final assembly works
• An accounts payable team to pay all of your suppliers
• A packaging and shipping team to get your product to your customer
• A supply chain management system to ensure you can scale appropriately

The list goes on and on; a big assembly is a BIG deal. What in any of the above sounded like CVD technology? Loosing focus on your core skill set yet?

Now imagine what’s going to happen when the economy surges up and down. You’ll have to scale right along with it to stay competitive. When things scale up too fast you can lose market share and revenue not being able to meet the demand for your product. When things scale down too fast it gets worse and you find yourself in the midst of layoffs to keep the company from running out of money. Layoffs are destructive; they disenchant your work force, cause your company to loose valuable knowledge, and damage your company’s culture.

Why we outsource

All of what is stated above is what drives outsourced manufacturing and services. So who do you go to when you want to outsource? Just like your core skill set, outsourced manufacturing also is specialized; not all are the same, not all know the same, and it’s not uncommon for a contract manufacturer to outsource sub-assemblies that they are not experts at building either. When a company departs from its skill set the most common side effect is a tremendous loss of quality. You can probably guess what the result of that looks like.

Just like your core skill set, outsourced manufacturing also is specialized.

Choosing experts

At Swagelok Northern California we are experts in fluid system technology. From synthetic diamonds, to drugs, to computer chips our fluid systems expertise helps our customers focus on their expertise. Our team knows what we do best and when we need help we pull in the experts. We help our customers reduce their costs by using our expertise to simplify, and when a Swagelok product is not a solution we won’t use it. If you want to schedule a visit but don’t have time, you can always tele-presence in and meet our team face-to-virtual face! When you need help we will answer the call and help you not be distracted from the things that you do the best.

Resources for you

Neil Ide has always been fascinated by the technical side of things. When he grew up, Ide served on Navy submarines as a nuclear plant operator. At Bloom Energy, a startup that makes power generation systems based on fuel cells, he worked with the R&D science teams to develop and build test equipment. At Swagelok California, he built up the assembly solutions program to handle more complex assemblies and created the popular Customer Briefing Center in our Fremont office. Get in touch