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Electronic Assembly Overview

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What if you have a factory and you make products for say the automotive industry. You find that the industry is starting to tail off a bit so you decide to go into a different direction. You do have a lot of equipment already including soldering and testing equipment. In this case your best choice would turn your factory into an electronic assembly facility. There is much demand for electronic assembling of products like circuit boards, and circuit panels to be used in TVs, radios, industrial equipment, and others. As a matter of fact, the process to get started is not much if you already have suppliers in place. Before you start making the move to producing electronic components, make sure you understand everything about the field and what electronic assembly is all about. This way you won’t find yourself in a precarious situation. Some topics that you will need to look at include:

• Low volume production: Depending on the contract you have and the client, you may be required to produce small or large circuit boards on a constant basis. In other words, you may have a quota to meet each and every day or week.
• Mid volume production: Just like above, you may have a client that has particular demands in mind. You may have a contract with a government facility that may require a certain number of units to be produced and delivered in a given week. Your equipment will have to be designed for it.
• High volume production: What about those heavy duty production jobs. You may get a contract that requires your factory to make a large amount of wiring harnesses or circuit boards. Can you meet this demand?
• Quick turnaround: Is your equipment reliable and fast so you can kick out so many units in a day. Is your inventory set up so as you make the parts, boards, or whatever it is that has to be made, will go out as you make it, or will it need to sit in a warehouse until the order comes in?
• Circuit testing: Let’s say you make circuit boards for machines. Also let’s say you have a major contract with a large government facility and this contract requires the most sophisticated circuit board to be made. You have the plans and produce it according to blue prints and schematics, but do you have testing equipment to verify the board works correctly before it leaves your department, in route to the warehouse for packing?
• Certification: If your industry requires you and all your workers to have certifications, do all of you have them? Some certifications may include ANSI standards, ISO certifications, QS 9000, AS9100, and FDA certification. Do you also follow US military and government specifications, the clean room act, and FED-ST-209E standard? These are concerns to think about.

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