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X-Ray Inspection Grows in a Challenging Electronics Market
By Kathryn Cramer S
tarting a new venture is always chal- lenging. Starting one in 2021, when worldwide supply chain issues disrupt-
ed the entire electronics assembly industry, may have seemed particularly daunting. But for co-founders Matthew Haber (CEO) and Philip Gulley (CRO), it was the right moment to launch Cofactr, a company that allows manufacturers to cut through tangled supply chains while protecting themselves from the current proliferation of counterfeit compo- nents.
New York-based Cofactr provides a sup-
ply chain platform that automates compo- nent sourcing, procurement, warehousing, inventory management and parts delivery. As Haber describes it, the process begins when a customer uploads a BOM (Bill of Materials) to Cofactr’s platform. The compa- ny’s software accesses current data from more than 700 distributors to identify the most optimal way to source parts ranging from standard components to highly complex and expensive chips.
Deep Traceability This extensive database provides “deep
traceability in a disrupted space,” he says, enabling Cofactr to differentiate between reputable and sometimes not-so-reputable “gray market” suppliers, who are often the
A Cofactr employee uses a Glenbrook Technologies Jewel Box 90T X-ray inspection system.
source of counterfeit components. “Differ - entiating between the two can be difficult,” Haber notes.
For added assurance, he explains, the
company does “a lot of supplier vetting upstream to prevent counterfeits” and, in the process, “weed out bad suppliers.” During the height of the supply chain crunch, manufac- turers without such software and research capabilities could find themselves “in a rough place.”
With Cofactr’s platform, however, once
the manufacturer is ready to purchase its BOM for a particular product run, “they just push a button and the computer issues the purchase orders,” Haber says. The materials are delivered to Cofactr’s warehouse, where they are subjected to the company’s rigorous in-house quality assurance process, includ- ing real-time X-ray inspection. Parts from a trustworthy, authorized
supplier may be sampled; others, depending on Cofactr’s “risk profile” for that supplier, undergo 100 percent inspection, comparing each part to a known good chip. This step is crucial, since many of Cofactr’s customers produce circuit boards used in the aerospace, medical device, robotics, automotive and retail technology industries — “mission-criti- cal hardware,” as Haber calls it. “If something goes wrong in a rocket
ship or a surgical robot, that’s really bad.” No manufacturer wants to waste time or money assembling a run of boards with even one bad Continued on page 69
October, 2023
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