IPC International Community magazine an association member publication
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IPC COMMUNITY 11 SPRING 2023 Arc-Tronics is an EMS company in Elk Grove Village, Illinois, providing electronics manu- facturing services for customers in the indus- trial, medical, aerospace, space, and defense industries. IPC Community talked to the com- pany president, Michael Goeringer, about the founding of Arc-Tronics and its member- ship in IPC. Please share with us a little history of the company. My father, Conrad (Connie) Goeringer, founded Arc-Tronics in 1972 in a basement kitty-corner from Wrigley Field in Chicago, naming it after the three siblings in his family, including himself, his sister Arlene, and brother Ronnie. Later, he moved to a 6,000-square- foot facility in Elk Grove Village, then into a 30,000 square foot facility. In 2000, we added 20,000 square feet. My father wanted a family business, and he got one. He raised capital from four i n v e s t o r s — a p p r o x i m a t e l y $12,000—to start the company and he just had the feeling that he could make the business work. He was doing cable and harness, power supply, and box build assembly, as at that time there was obviously no surface mount technology. I now own the business with my sister and brother, Marla and Matthew. We have 200 employees, and we're on the path to $50 million in sales this year. In fact, we've seen tremendous growth in the past several years. How has IPC contributed to your growth? We participate in IPC's monthly EMS market surveys and quarterly North American EMS business performance surveys for information like sales and orders, material costs, and labor costs. Quite often in the past, customers have tried to tell us our operating expenses or our markups are too high, but I have all the facts from the surveys. Because it's hard to find financials for smaller businesses like ours, the IPC surveys are hugely beneficial. I like the way the results are categorized by company size. It's reassuring to know, "Hey, we're headed in the right direction," or, "We need to take a look at this; our numbers are not in line with IPC's survey for the sales sector in the industry." I have attended IPC APEX EXPO for at least 25 years and the EMS Leadership Summit has been so beneficial to me. The networking is vital, and I've formed a good group I can rely on. For example, one EMS provider I've met at the sum- mit just recently let me know he had some extra parts he didn't need because some of his orders were canceled. In this group, we help each other out. We ask how it's going and what each other is dealing with. Arc-Tronics: Quality Runs in the Family By Linda Stepanich