Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1534385
years. When you do one thing for 40 years, you become really good at it. We've had many opportunities to be bought out, and we are not interested in that. I believe there's a market for a single small, boutique- type shop. In shops like ours, you know who is building your product, and you know where it's being built. We don't try and mix in pro- duction with our quick-turn. We are quick- turn, period. What technologies are you playing in? Being a prototype shop, we do a little bit of everything. However, our real expertise is RF, microwave, high speed, and antennas. We don't build flex and rigid-flex. erefore, we wanted to excel in a technology that doesn't compete with the low-cost shops out there, and that really is in RF, microwave, and antennas. It's also because we understand that frequency matters, and in RF and antenna it truly does. You have to be specialized and cognizant of the nuances of the manufacturing that goes into RF boards— and we are. I understand the antenna market is quite robust. What have you seen? Yes, absolutely. We've seen a real increase in phased array antennas, and we're doing them in six weeks, whereas the competition is taking 20+ weeks. That certainly sounds like a market distinguisher. Let's talk about business and the market. How did it go for you in Q1? We experienced a typi- cal beginning-of-the-year slowdown, but things are absolutely back up to normal now, and we are expecting a very strong year. It seems like everyone experienced that slow- down in January. Everyone gets their orders in by the end of year, especially in the prototype market. It then takes a few weeks to a month, and even three months for some companies, to do all the test- ing and implementation before they release an update or revision or move forward with the project. Why do you project that 2025 will be a good year for ACE? With the current U.S. administration's aggres- sive stance on global business and trade, we expect the aerospace industry to be very robust this year. I think we will be swamped. When it comes to military, aerospace, defense, and our domestic capacity to sup- port it, are you concerned about U.S. shops not having enough capacity? Will you be turn- ing customers away? At the end of last year, we got close to reaching a level of discomfort, which I consider to be at about 90% of capacity, though we handled it very well. I do not expect there to be a capac- ity issue this year. I know that a lot of other shops have consolidated, and that's increased the manufacturing capacity in the U.S. I don't 46 PCB007 MAGAZINE I APRIL 2025