At the heart of the digital revolution Aspocomp

at the heart of the digital revolution

By tapping into the right megatrends in the PCB industry, Finland’s Aspocomp is firmly established on a fast growth track

Innerlayer Developing, eching and Stripping (DeS) - © Aspocomp Pattern plating - © Aspocomp Work-in-progress - © Aspocomp

In 2019 Aspocomp, the Finland-based advanced Printed Circuit Board (PCB) company, celebrated its 40th anniversary. Aspocomp was founded in 1979 and enjoyed rapid growth during Finland’s cellphone boom. In 1999 it was demerged from the Aspo Group to operate as an independent listed company.

Now in its 20th year as an independent company, Aspocomp sees itself at a turning point. It is expanding its business geographically and diversifying from the telecom sector to other sectors such as automotive, security and defence and IC testing. It now aims to utilise its strong partner network to serve customers during the whole lifecycle of their product.

Mikko Montonen, President & CEO of Aspocomp since the spring of 2014, summarises the secret of the company’s success: “We stepped up our sales efficiency. We shifted from product-focused thinking to a service-oriented, customer-focused approach to operations and harnessed our own strengths.”

The company’s strengths include the specialties of its Oulu plant: high-tech expertise, agility and suitability for producing small series that mass manufacturers in Asia are not interested in or which are simply not a good fit for their processes. “As we developed our own operations, we analysed the markets to identify new fields of business that could benefit from Aspocomp’s expertise – one of these is the automotive industry.”

Fast growing markets

The automotive industry is now one of Aspocomp’s fastest-growing customer segments. Whereas a cellphone includes only a few PCBs, one car requires as many as 140 – and in the years ahead, vehicles will feature even more technology.

In addition to the automotive industry, Aspocomp has heavily specialised in product development and testing of semiconductors. “Aspocomp PCBs are used in the testing of high-tech components for 5G, the automotive industry, industrial internet, machine-tomachine and digitalisation needs in general,” says Montonen. 5G, the latest generation of mobile data, is now everywhere. It substantially speeds up data transfer and thus paves the way for great changes in many industries. For Aspocomp, this means new customers and projects in years to come.

As well as continuing to develop its high-tech and high-quality operations, Aspocomp has succeeded in identifying the international megatrends that support its own operations and seizing the opportunities they open up. Many of these megatrends are based on technological development. In addition to 5G, these include robotics, artificial intelligence, the industrial internet and the defence and security industry.

Advanced manufacturing - volume production

Aspocomp’s business model is based on high-tech advanced manufacturing in Finland and volume supply from Asia. Its manufacturing plant in Oulu, Finland, is a state-of-art quick-turn facility for HDI (High Density Interconnection), advanced HDI, high layercount PCB’s and special technologies e.g. different heat management technologies (Heatsink, Coin etc)

As well as its volume manufacturing operations in China, India and Thailand, Aspocomp has six partners in China. All Aspocomp partners have successfully passed VDA 6.3 assessment and have TS16949 certification. They have been carefully selected to provide the best mix of different volume and technology offerings.

Aspocomp’s sourcing and supply management office, located in Shenzhen, China, is responsible for daily supplier activities i.e. delivery monitoring, quality assurance and logistics.

Customers utilising Aspocomp’s unique offering through full product life cycle can expect Design for Manufacturability (DFM) feedback on request, not only for prototypes, but for expected volume manufacturing as well.

mechanical drilling - © Aspocomp

Growth strategy delivers

Aspocomp was able to report on a highly successful performance in 2018. Year-on-year net sales grew 22 per cent, rising to their highest level since 2006. Growth was clearly faster than the PCB market as a whole, which is expected to grow by approximately 5.5 per cent. The CEO commented: “The customer segments selected in the current business strategy all posted strong growth, with the exception of the security and defence segment. In the telecommunications network segment, demand was strengthened by the development of the next generation of 5G technology and the launch of the first commercial networks and equipment. The segment has over 10 significant customers and total growth was 42 per cent. Development was slightly more moderate in both the automotive industry and industrial electronics segments, about 17 and 15 per cent, respectively. The semiconductor testing segment grew by as much as 54 per cent and its net sales amounted to EUR 2 million.’

Mikko Montonen added: “The ongoing EUR 10 million investment program focuses in the first stage on enhancing the capabilities of the Oulu plant, while the main focus in the second stage is to increase its capacity. Most of the first stage equipment has been ordered and installation will be completed in 2019.”

The results for 2019 are expected to show net sales at approximately 10 per cent higher compared with 2018 and the operating result to be even better. “Sales remained stable despite uncertain market conditions,” said Mr Montonen, “As in the previous year, demand swung to very strong growth towards the end of September and the order book strengthened significantly from the comparison period.

“Cash flow from operating activities was more than double compared to the previous year. The order book was at the record high of EUR 4.9 million at the end of the third quarter, a year-on-year increase of 60 per cent.” n

mikko montonen President and Ceo © Aspocomp