Interview


Brand transition at Smiths Interconnect leads to new focus


CIE editor, Amy Wallington talks to Paul Harris, vice president sales, Smiths Interconnect about recent changes within the company and how they have become a “force to be reckoned with”


S


miths Group plc has been around since the mid-1800s and started off making watches and clocks; some


clocks from Smiths can still be found in antique shops. The company has since grown into a global technology company. “I joined Smiths Group about two years ago,” comments Harris. “It’s a very interesting and diverse group. It has been built up mainly through acquisitions of different companies.” Smiths Interconnect, a division of Smiths


Paul Harris 12 May 2017


Group plc, recently unified its technology brands (EMC Technology, Hypertac, IDI, Lorch, Millitech, RF Labs, Sabritec, TECOM and TRAK) under the single brand identity of ‘Smiths Interconnect’. This transition has made it easier for customers to deal with the company and for the company to focus on significant growth areas. With its aim to be one of the top technology global companies worldwide, Smiths Group is changing its focuses to ensure this is achieved. “We are focusing on technology, growth, markets that have growth potential and we are concentrating, particularly, on markets where we can at least be amongst the top


Components in Electronics


three in our chosen fields,” Harris declares. “There are lots of changes within the


Group to make this happen and one of those changes is in my division. I am part of Smiths Interconnect Division. When I started as president of the Smiths Connectors business unit, there were similar but distinct business units running alongside one another, and it was quite complex. Customers would have been seeing different presidents, different sales teams, and there would have been different structures for very complementary technologies. So we have now transitioned the business units under Smiths Interconnect’s banner. “Now, we just have one structure, one


sales force, one strategy and it makes it easier for customers to deal with us as they have a single point of contact. When we go and see customers, we now have a bigger bag to sell and we can increase our technology presence within the customer base and, especially among major OEMs.” This shift also focuses on creating a


more agile structure throughout the company that can better anticipate and respond to customers’ growing needs. Smiths Group wants to grow further and in order to do this, Harris says: “We have put a lot of passion and energy into our sales team and specific markets where we want to grow through technology developments. We are going to be a technology advanced company where we will mostly focus on markets where technology plays a key role in the future.”


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One of the ways the company is changing is by focusing on key markets throughout the organisation rather than just at the front line. Harris explains: “Other companies just focus on their sales forces but we have gone from the top to the bottom and focused on markets throughout our organisation. Our marketing organisation is segmented by markets so we have market leaders within the marketing organisation. We also have sales people that focus on specific market sectors, so they understand the trends and the technology advances. Our engineering department is also now segregated by market sectors and so also our operations are now market sectored so we have factories currently producing products for the different market segments. In summary, we are vertically integrated towards market sectors all the way through the whole organisation.”


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