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78 SMT Magazine • March 2016 by adrian Nishimoto SPECTrUM ASSEMBlY INC. Many electronics manufacturing services providers are expert at board-level and box build assembly. However, most do only limited cable and harness assembly in-house. The benefits of providing cable and har- ness assembly services in-house to custom- ers are three-fold. First, the business focus on cable assembly ensures that volumes are pres- ent for both cost competitive material prices and a level of automation that keeps labor costs competitive. For example, on a medical device with both printed circuit board assem- blies (PCBAs) and cables, an EMS firm that has the capability to provide cable and harness as- sembly will be able to reduce the cost on the product's cables by leveraging their cable buy- ing power. Second, doing the work in-house does more than eliminate a layer of supply chain markup; it also decreases lead-time while im- proving the ability to respond to customer schedule changes. Finally, expertise in cable assembly adds val- ue when product designs have cable manufac- turability issues. The ability to provide expertise in cable assembly can add significant value be- cause cables are often thought of as a less chal- lenging part of product design. Typically, com- panies put a great deal of focus on design of the PCBAs and the overall unit itself, but the design team may not be expert at cable design. Some common cable design related issues include: • Wrong terminal or contact for spec- ified wire gauge: If the contact is too large, the crimp will be too loose and will fall off. Conversely, if it is too small the crimp will be too tight and may damage the wire strand im- mediately or completely destroy it over time. In some cases, the terminal specification is cor- rect, but an incorrect wire gauge or tolerance is specified. The Benefits of a Vertically Integrated Approach to EMS fEatu rE