Circuits Assembly - November 2007 - (Page 47)

SEAs 2007 Our customer service plan is a highly detailed, well-documented program that permeates every single aspect of DEK’s business – from a customer’s first interaction with us on the phone or at a show through to development of a completely new process or application. This kind of service and the level of innovative support tools we provide doesn’t just happen; it is a carefully executed plan to ensure success and total customer satisfaction. Winning five consecutive Service Excellence Awards is no coincidence. CA: What do you do if service levels fall below your organization’s standards? How do you determine those standards? NM: Through our various metrics, we have well-defined and measured standards. Certain customer grades that fall below the standard (and DEK’s standard is very high) are followed up immediately, and a detailed course of action is undertaken. We conduct a root cause analysis, present every case that has fallen below our standards and present a resolution. And, again, this is not just about a machine that might be down; it is a service for all products at all levels of the organization. CA: How important is customer service to the bottom line? NM: It’s everything. Superior customer service directly translates to repeat sales and leading market share. Over the past several years, DEK has made tremendous market share gains, and I believe this is a direct result of our ability to deliver unrivaled process expertise, superior products and of course outstanding customer service. The cost of excellent support is high; it’s a tremendous investment but, in the end, only has positive impacts on the bottom line. CA: What is the length of your business relationship with a typical customer? NM: The majority of our customer relationships last for many years. Our repeat order percentage is extremely high – again, an indicator of superior products, expertise and support. CA: Does your company place greater emphasis on retaining customers or gaining new ones? NM: Both are equally important. And, in fact, having satisfied customers serves to enable new business gains. I believe our five-year SEA run, in tandem with our continued market share gains, validates this. ■ Visit us at Productronica, Hall A3, Booth 263 Continued from pg. 28 What our company has discovered is that a reel-to-reel system is the most cost-effective way to achieve speed, accuracy and substrate control (Figure 1). Remember these substrates are a little weird and wonderful. Cardboard and paper are porous materials, so moving them into the printer, enabling printing stability within the system during material deposition, and then moving the substrate out – all without tearing them – takes ingenuity and inventiveness. Also, because the enzymes are layered one on top of the other, this process happens inline – usually with several printing systems. The substrate is unrolled and travels all the way down the line through each material deposition process before getting re-rolled onto the cylinder at the end of the line. This is a delicate operation, to say the least. As I’ve said, the possibilities for high-accuracy printing applications are endless. With biosensor manufacturing, just as with countless other applications, it’s just a matter of understanding what the end-product has to be and using the right screen printing equipment and know-how to develop novel ways of facilitating the process. As for medical manufacturing, the prognosis for robust high-volume manufacturing is excellent! ■ Reference 1. A. Primavera, R. Roberts and R. Subrahmanyan, “Medical Electronics Pose Unique Challenges,” Global SMT and Packaging, July 2007. circuitsassembly.com Circuits Assembly NOVEMBER 2007 47 http://www.seho.de http://circuitsassembly.com http://www.seho.de

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Circuits Assembly - November 2007

Circuits Assembly - November 2007 Contents Caveat Lector Industry News Market Watch Talking Heads Focus on Business Global Sourcing On the Forefront Screen Printing Better Manufacturing Pb-Free Manufacturing from a Tier III EMS Perspective ‘Living Documents, Subject to Change’ Creating Ideal Solder Joints An Alternative Drying Process for MSDs ‘Customer Satisfaction is More than a Score’ Optoelectronic Substrates: Will They Happen? Tech Tips Wave Soldering Process Doctor Test and Inspection Getting Lean Materials World Equipment Advances Product Spotlight Assembly Insider Technical Abstracts Ad Index

Circuits Assembly - November 2007

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