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SMS — Smart Made Simple Supports Customers from Concept to Commerce
By Chris Johns, CTO, SMS — Smart Made Simple S
MS — Smart Made Simple has been in the UK electronics industry for approaching 100 years, and the company has a reputation as a
“go to” manufacturer to take an electronic product from concept to commerce. The positive association brings many brand
benefits, but it also opens the floodgates for many enquiries from the startup community. The technology industry has an appreciation that innovation is no longer the sole responsi- bility of the company’s R&D team. Globally we have seen a real trend develop for the OEM to partner with their EMS provider to harness the process from concept to creation, while religiously protecting their IP. We can see this in the Tier 1 environ-
ment, for example, at Jabil’s Blue Sky Cen- ter and Flex’s Product Innovation Center. However, this market need is not exclusive to Tier 1, as it requires accessibility and the right fit.
and the ability to scale. Given that time is of the essence, SMS prides
itself on its “open book” policy. The company is honest and challenging during initial conversa- tions with partners to validate the concept in a timely manner. This is a benefit for both parties.
l They have a full circuit diagram and the first Engineering Resources
SMS’ sweet spot is customer number two, and it is not alone. This category has been one of the main drivers for the influx of design houses opening to offer solutions in mechan- ical, optical, software, and firmware design. To this technology cluster, bringing to-
gether these vertical services becomes like a jigsaw puzzle as they try to navigate how to put in place their supply chain. Of course, too many touchpoints increase risk and sup- ply chain fragility. This is why more OEMs are demanding in-house vertical integration to reduce complexity and risk, while keep- ing the end goal of speed in focus. As the company gets more involved at
Start Out Right Over 500,000 startups fail every year. Given
SMS’ development services area offers customers access to state-of-the-art equipment for prototype manufacturing.
the complexity and risk associated with product in- troduction, SMS’ OEM customers understand that their need is the success rate of product introduc- tion, development and market adoption, in an en- vironment where speed-to-market and time-in- yield is critical. Common challenges that developmental cus-
tomers face include time-to-market risk, limited engineering resources, access to state-of-the-art equipment, market entry and supply chain risk,
Time becomes a very valuable commodity during the product introduction phase. From experience, this is when the company
tends to categorize its startup customers into three types:
l They have an idea, but do not know how to im- They have had an idea implemented and quali-
plement it. l
fied using a developmental platform, such as Raspberry PI, but they now need support and se- curity in its evolution.
CONASHIELD “Flood Coat” Technology
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Better Electronic Insulation and Vibration Dampening Properties than Traditional Conformal Coating Systems
A True Balance of Properties Horizontal
Build 4-8mm
Surface Mount Components
Vertical Build 2-4mm
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this point of the production lifecycle, it can also help to erode a scenario that is all too common: over-engineering. As developmen-
tal companies start to get excited about their prod- uct, there is a tendency to over-engineer the prod- uct for the intended target market. SMS’ engineering experts will strip back the
requirements to quote for what they believe the market actually requires, matching the product to its intended application. These consultative ac- tions reduce unnecessary complexity and cost. However, this is never a cost conversation, but a volume/product tailoring to suit. The company often works to remove compo-
Continued on next page
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