Publication date: 20 May 2010
Bliss Industries offers a wide variety of ESD-safe products for industries specializing in lean electronics manufacturing. Our carts and racks safely store fragile PC boards, SMT feeders, fixtures, tooling and inventory. They protect them from damage and factory abuse with a heavy duty welded tubular steel frame. For more than 30 years, Bliss has been the leader in SMT cart-based manufacturing systems, increasing uptime and throughput. Bliss provides expert process engineering support, as well as custom cart engineering.
A. My role at the company will change dramatically as I pass some of my sales duties to a future sales manager and focus more on marketing. Currently, I am still very much involved in sales and customer relations, as that is very much a passion of mine. We are already working on a new catalog, debuting our four new products and several new things that are happening at Bliss. The catalog should be available within the next month.
A. It really was our customers that drove the development. There were so many needs, even during the downturn. It gave us the time to work closely with a few key customers, as well as some of our sales representatives to develop these fantastic new products. Based on our customers’ needs and problems, our engineering team produced four fantastic new products. There were several other custom projects we worked on in the past year, but I felt that these four were the most exciting and versatile, and these were premiered at the recent IPC APEX exhibition and conference.
A. This is correct. Conlec of Florida saw the product and understood the vision. Often times when an operator goes to splice, their tape, tools and trash are all over the work surface, or sometimes missing. The cart keeps everything in one place and allows the tools to be bolted onto the surface or side bins so that they cannot “walk off.” By keeping everything in one central location, the SMT Splicing Cart is ready to go at a moment’s notice. The trash bin is connected and the cart provides slots for all of the tools and accessories, as well as a nice work surface to splice on.
A. This cart is fantastic, and makes the life of an operator trying to do burn-in or test so much easier. The cart is UL listed and allows for power to be plugged directly into the top of cart, which then allows the female plug strips to plug directly into the back of the customer’s chassis to begin burn-in. All the customers have to do is hook up their own cables. The Custom Test/Burn-In Cart is designed for safety, simplification and ease of use.
A. The company has changed immensely. Our engineering department and capabilities have advanced significantly. Our manufacturing has become far more efficient and lean than ever before, therefore producing the highest quality product in a very short period of time. As a kid, I worked in manufacturing as a summer job putting mats in trays. It would take hours, and just seeing the process and tools that we have developed to speed up simple things like this is amazing. The product line is almost unrecognizable because of how much it has grown and changed.
A. Our customers benefit so much from having the finest reps in the industry bring our product to their facility. So many of our customers consider our reps good friends and know that they would never represent a line that they did not believe in 100 percent. I think this helps customers to understand the true benefit, and to see that they are getting a product they can count on for many years to come.
A. It is definitely possible. There are more than 20 new custom products currently in development. Hopefully, some of those will be versatile enough that we can make a standard version for all of our customers. I know there will be some changes to current products, for example, a smaller version of the magazine transfer cart may become standard. If we do launch new products, it will be in the September timeframe.
