Touch International completes cleanroom renovation
Provides four times more cleanroom space
Touch International, a US manufacturer of touch screens, has completed renovations to its Austin, Texas factory cleanroom, which produces prototype and specialist components for military, medical and aerospace displays.
The work concludes the second phase of the company’s US$10m global development effort, which started last year with the opening of its 50,000ft² STAR manufacturing facility in Shenzhen, China.
The company says the Austin renovation gives it four times more cleanroom space to accommodate increased market demand for projected capacitive and resistive touch screen displays.
“As the market shifted away from the Palm Pilot to the Apple iPhone technology, many of our military, medical and aerospace customers have followed suit – this has required a paradigm shift in the science of touch screen manufacturing,” said Michael Woolstrum, chief executive of Touch International.
“By renovating our Austin facility and building a vertically integrated factory in Shenzhen, China, Touch International is better able to support this technology shift and accommodate for current and future market demands.”
With property and plant improvements now complete, the company with Texas Manufacturing Assistance Center (TMAC) aims to maximise efficiency by further implementing LEAN manufacturing principles into the organisation.
“Touch International has used a variety of LEAN tools to identify substantial improvement opportunities,” said Carson Miller, TMAC project manager. “While keeping sharp focus on customer needs, these efforts will yield a dramatic reduction in lead time, improved product quality and improved operational effectiveness.”
Once adopted in Austin, these LEAN business concepts will be rolled out to its STAR facility to support market needs better by reducing scrap, increasing yields, and ultimately saving customers money.
