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EM Asia: Tell us about some of your company’s activities in South EastAsia and India. Fussner: TransTechnology, for many years, has had a large educational component. We sell equipment, of course, but we are always looking for what value-added we can bring to our clients. So many years ago, we started our road show concept where we originally went to South East Asian cities like Singapore, Penang, Bangkok and Manila. There we held technology seminars that tackle issues and problems in SMT from screen printing, lead-free and RoHS to conformal coating, underfill dispensing and more. So every year, we tackle a new issue in electronics assembly. These seminars were very popular so we reinstituted it in India. Last year in December, we held seminars in Pune, Delhi, Bangalore and Chennai. We brought all our principles out and again, these seminars were educational rather than sales oriented. Feed back from the clients have been extraordinary. They usually get invited to sales seminars but not those that concentrate on pure technology. So we are going to hold one again in the fourth quarter of this year. Another part of our educational component is the establishment of application centers that are a combination of labs, universities and demo rooms. We have these now in Singapore and Bangkok, and we will be opening one in Delhi soon – 6500 square feet of office, lab and demo room. There, we will have equipment such as the Heller reflow ovens and Yamaha chip shooters. We will also bring in conformal coating and vision technology. In Singapore, the application center is really more of a lab where engineers come to us with their boards and components, and their problems in their process. And we work to provide them with the solutions. In Thailand, it has taken a totally different character. The center there has become more like a university. Every week for a year and a half, we had people coming in for training on equipment usage. This works out for us because when they are trained, they can take care of their own machines, so its win-win all around. EM Asia: Everyone has been talking about India as next-in-line, after China, to become the so-called “factory of the world”. What role do you see the country playing in the electronicsindustry? Fussner: Right now, India has taken on many roles in the electronics industry. The country is really just at the beginning. In electronics assembly, India is roughly 3 to 4 percent of China’s market – a very small percentage. Be that as it may, the whole Indian economy is growing 10 percent a year. Automotive is growing roughly at 15 to 20 percent and white goods are growing at a large percentage. A lot of the manufacturing in India is for domestic consumption. But then again you are talking about a billion plus population consisting of 250 million middle class. So that is a lot of consumption. In other areas of electronics, India is doing some design, and getting into back-end semiconductor manufacturing. So we can extrapolate from this how India will change. Semiconductors will advance; and active and passive component manufacturing as well as PCB production will start in the country. So India has a lot of room for growth. I see a great future for the country but right now, the market numbers are far behind that of China’s. EM Asia: What is your company’s roadmap for India? Fussner: At present, we have an office in Delhi. Next year, we will set up another lab either in the west or in the south of the country, and in the following year, we will do the same. We will increase our head count as we have always done – on an organic basis. So as machines numbers grow so will service and sales populations. Right now, we offer services in Delhi, Mumbai, Pune, Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad. EM Asia: How do you think recent world events like rising oil prices and a falling US economy will affect the electronics industry and your company’s business? Fussner: This year has already been a relatively slow start for our company. Its not easy to predict but I am not expecting a great year but also not really expecting a horrible year. If I were to put in a guess, it would be somewhere in the middle. However, if the US really does go into a recession, we will definitely be hit. Although a lot of people have been talking about decoupling, US consumer spending is vital for our industry. I am hoping things will turn out fine but we willsee how it goes.
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