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Where has the time gone?
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E.T 'phoned home' The Falklands War was in full flow. Aston Villa won the European Cup. Knight Rider made its' first appearance. Time magazine awards its' 'Man of the Year' award to a computer ! and 30,000 women join hands at Greenham Common in a peace protest.
1982 was a momentous year for many reasons. Whilst many of us were waking to the sounds of the ' Hairy Cornflake' two small companies were being born in Sussex. PES Brighton Ltd, an electronic contract manufacturer, and Tenkay Electronics Ltd, looking after the distribution needs for local manufacturers.
We've come a very long way since those days, from a small industrial unit to an international contract manufacturer based in purpose built facilities in Lancing, Sussex and manufacturing facilities in Asia.
In 1996, after 11 years of working as an alliance to each other, two stores, two sales, two purchasing one roof; the two companies joined forces to become one of the South coasts' leading contract manufacturers. Powerful established purchasing abilities conjoined with manufacturing excellence has allowed the company to go from strength to strength.
Over the last 25 years we've seen so many changes within the contract manufacturing sectors that sometimes it's hard to keep up. We feel very proud and privileged to be where we are within the manufacturing industry. We've grown at a healthy, but very manageable pace over the years, allowing us to make capital investments in plant equipment . Self funding has always been a key factor for us. Apart from generic growth, in the year 2000, Tenkay acquired a small local sub-contract manufacturer and the assets of another who had sadly gone into liquidation. This gave us the impetus to spread our rather cosy facilities into a second building and to re-evaluate our production methods. More space meant that we could start to look at higher volume production but this had it's natural obstacles. Cost! We all know that higher volume production within the UK, unfortunately is not always an option, and so the search for facilities overseas was initiated . We were very fortunate to find a manufacturer in Asia whose production ethics matched those of Tenkays. In addition to this, a definite bonus for Tenkay and our clients, is the fact that we have an English contact who is fluent in the local dialects. Communication barriers are not something that Tenkay have to contend with.
This gave us an additional service to those that, as contract manufactures, were expected. Wiring, Panel and Box assembly. Pcb population. Wire preparation. Turnkey production. Now we could add overseas high volume, low cost options. Quality is not affected by this option. Both sites, here in the UK and in Asia are accredited to ISO 9001. Our UK facilities since 1994. All products suggested for overseas production must go through a very rigorous sample approval process before production can commence.
Due to continued growth, in 2004, Tenkay Electronics Ltd moved into its large purpose built premises in Lancing and amalgamate its' two existing sites. Uniting the workforce has proved to be the right move for the company, staff and our clients. Like so many people, when we moved 'home' we wondered what we would do with all the extra space! However, concentrated targeted Marketing has resulted in the need to expand again earlier this year. Additional manufacturing space was required to accommodate the latest addition to our automated facilities, the I-Pulse M4e pick and place systems incorporating the 2000 HT Horizontal convection re-flow oven and PC Board handler to cater for growth in the PCB area. This purchase also called for a general realignment of our production cells. Dedicated areas have been established and lean manufacturing re-enforced.
Mmm! 25 years! We've progressed from supplying only very local clients to those also based in Korea, China and Russia. We've developed from supplying one major manufacturing market to an extremely diverse range of sectors. In reality, Tenkay produced products are involved in some way in everybodies day to day life if you know where to look.
Yes we've all got a little older... We cringe when we know the words to songs that younger members of staff think are ' new releases' . ( If only they knew we were singing the originals at school and you only 'mixed' in cookery classes). Yes some of us don't look as fresh as we used to, but like our industry, we've adapted our maturity and experience to the desires of our clients. We have the patience and we believe, the knowledge to help you reduce your production lead times, costs, and stress.
Sometimes you have to take a step back to see just how far you have come, and what has been achieved. Experience can't be bought, but it can be shared. Like a good bag of sweets, we're here to share.
For more information also see Julys issue of Electronics Sourcing. Please visit our link section to take you to their site. Thank you.
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