Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1484263
86 PCB007 MAGAZINE I NOVEMBER 2022 meet with our designers. We ask "What do you need? What is driving this project or this need? What do you want?" Personally, I'm not a tech- nical guy, and I let the true engineers handle this business. Miralles: Nate, can you talk about the KPIs we have with the factories and how we support them? We have improvement plans, and it's like mutual cooperation between the factories and us. Martin: Yes, sure. With the approved vendors and even with the new vendors, we have a mandatory annual audit. Every year we spend a few days checking every single thing from the machines to paper to people; we check everything. Now, we do it on a monthly basis based on KPIs because we have figures for everything. We know the quote requests and how many of them there are. We follow the time they take to make an offer. We track the accuracy of the technical question because they have an engineer as well. We monitor on- time delivery (OTDs). Jean-Christophe moni- tors the OTD. We monitor quality, of course, with defective pieces per million (DPPM), the lot reject rates (LRR) for the inspected batch, because we have people onsite at each fac- tory who check the technical parts of the PCBs before they are shipped to the customer. We have strict targets to ensure an almost defect- free result. Johnson: Using those KPIs, working with your suppliers obviously is an expected conver- sation. You have KPIs to ensure you're get- ting quality material to make a quality prod- uct. How does ICAPE Group identify or dis- cuss a problem that the customer would need to solve by themselves, whether it's a design change that might improve yield, etc.? How do you get involved in that? Martin: Let's just say that, sometimes, they treat a simple double-sided 4-layer or 6-layer and feel they have a need that is beyond their control. I've received these kinds of complex PCBs, or I see that they are using a certain American material. ey will say, "When I see this that is non-standard, I might discuss it with the FAE people." FAE will join a specific meeting; we don't leave this to the sales team because they do not understand. ey will go directly to the customer with that technical person to discuss specifically what the customer wants. is is step one. e customer will say, "I don't know, I just want to use this material because I heard it was good." But what's the reason? ey don't know. We talk back and forth and they set some rules: "Let's say for this, I need this kind of material, and who as a manufacturer can do it?" e next step is on the manufacturing side and we'll start to discuss where the factory is. en it's written down and filed so we know what everybody can do. We also discuss with the technical person to be 100% sure before we make the recommendation, to be sure they can actually do it. We don't want to be in a situation where we said yes, but it could be a no. at is something we really don't like. Johnson: How early do FAEs get involved with the customers for that kind of discussion? Martin: It depends on the customer. Sometimes it can happen if, for instance, we talk about price stability.