Contract Production manufactures a range of sub-contract electronic manufacturing products and circuit boards for a wide variety of industries. This can be one-off prototypes, up to volumes in their 100,000s. A recent investment and installation of a AM100 Panasonic Pick and Place line has enabled the company to increase its output by 400%.

The new production line manufactures circuit boards and can place 30,000 components per hour. 

Simon Norris, MD, says: “This essentially, means that we now measure productivity in seconds not minutes. Thanks to the new production line we have added an extra 30-40 weeks of working capacity to the business annually; that translates from the single shift pattern we currently have, to potentially up to three shifts. In time, that could see our work force go from 20 to between 50 and 60 employees which will be great news for the area.”

The new pick and place system was manufactured in the Far East and shipped to manufacturing base in Pickering at the end of 2017. The system has effectively streamlined the company’s whole process, taking a bare printed circuit board, populating it and producing an inspected product at the end of the line. The whole process can take less than one tenth of a second. 

“Obviously, the speed depends on the complexity of the circuit board or product we are producing,” said Simon.

He added: “There has been a lot of talk about the UK’s stagnating productivity levels but this investment into Contract Productions shows there is opportunity and we can now deliver on much larger orders with improved turnaround for our customers that we could only dream of a few weeks ago. It is a major leap forward technology-wise and we are all very excited about the possibilities is brings for the business and our customers.”

As well as the larger orders going into the hundreds of thousands Contract Production also produces one-off prototypes for clients – often hand-made – for new products yet to go to market. These can be anything that requires circuit boards, from GPS tracking devices to wind turbines, cameras to deep sea oil drilling rigs.