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February 2017 • SMT Magazine 87 VIRTEX DISCUSSES EMS CHALLENGES, NEW TECHNOLOGIES AND TRENDS Las Marias: What are the greatest challenges that your customers are facing? Heath: The biggest challenge for our custom- ers is a combination of talent acquisition and shorter technology timeframes. The length of time to build cutting edge products is going to become shorter and shorter, so they really have to try to stay ahead of the thought, process and technology curve, in terms of their product de- velopment—the design cycles, the product cy- cles, from a lifetime standpoint, are significant- ly shorter than they were five to 10 years ago. Las Marias: Talent acquisition is also a major problem? Heath: Yes, they must get the best and the brightest to develop those products. They need people who can come up with the new ideas and can think creatively to develop products, not just do things like the next generation of products that they already have. People are looking for new ways to break their new mar- kets within the same companies. Las Marias: Where does VirTex come in to help customers address their challenges? Heath: We've created strong partnerships, both with leading-edge design firms and top vertical manufacturers. We've also partnered with com- munity colleges and universities, to find the next generation of talent, creating apprentice- ships and internship programs, to bring those people in and get them familiar with what we are doing. It's hard to have all of the engineering tal- ent under one roof. You need people who un- derstand wireless, you need people who know power supply design, and so on. Those are typ- ically different design disciplines and typically not in the same design houses. We've partnered with those who we feel are the best in the local- ities where we serve, to be able to recommend them and connect them with customers and provide solutions and the talent that they need. Las Marias: What capabilities does VirTex bring to the table to help customers address their manufac- turing challenges? Heath: We have software that is world-class in the supply chain—we've received awards in that arena—some of the business analytics and qual- ity analytics, we've developed a lot of custom software and custom security to safeguard the Among the key factors to consider when selecting an EMS partner are cultural fit and flexibility. You really need a strong, customer-focused team where, if a customer calls with a new product or demands changes, the EMS can pull together with the customer and realign the supply chain and manufacturing resources to meet the challenge.