CONTRACT MANUFACTURING
started in September 1978 in part of a small rented garage in Erie PA. “At first it was just the two of them, Dave and my dad, working on mold components, then they got their first full design and fabricate mold job,” Philip said. “It was a success and more like it came in, and they eventually grew the business.”
Initially they had just a few pieces of used equipment: “A surface grinder, saw, maybe a Bridgeport,” Philip said. “Mead was designing on a drafting board, of course: This is before the era for CAD and computers. They didn’t have enough money for heat—there were a lot of nights when they had to work with hats and gloves on.”
By 1989, business and the company had grown enough that they could start Plastikos with a third partner, Gary McConnell, and three injection molding machines in a rented incubator. Now in 2015, Micro Mold has state-of-the-art tool and moldmaking equipment, supporting metrology equipment, and 22 employees, while Plastikos has 108 workers across
three shifts, 30 presses, an ISO 7 Class 10,000 clean room and an R&D department. Timothy Katen and the other founders have all retired: the senior Katen retired in 2009 but is still on the companies’ Board of Directors. Philip and Ryan and their partner, engineering manager Rob Cooney, have run the show since then. “Currently, Plastikos is 5580 m2
total, with 27 production
presses and three R&D presses that are physically located in an R&D molding room at Micro Mold,” Philip Katen said. “We run 24 hours, 5+ days a week. At present, we are running at ~75–80% capacity. “Additionally, in August 2014 Plastikos broke ground on a large medical expansion, which will add 1581 m2
. The heart
of it will be an ISO 7 [Class 10,000] clean room molding floor along with a separate ISO 7 [Class 10,000] assembly and secondary operations lab. The expansion will accommodate eight clean room injection molding machines with space for robotics and automation. Once complete, it will support ~30% of additional capacity for the two companies.”
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AdvancedManufacturing.org | January 2015
12/10/14 1:00 PM
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