The life of any successful product begins at the design phase - long before that first tentative batch production run. Over the years, more and more of Fibox's OEM customers have recognised the importance of this simple premise, and have taken advantage of the company's ability to design their particular products from the ground up. And strong partnerships have been formed as a result of these early design exercises, with customers benefiting from the enclosure specialist's years of design experience. Better, faster and more efficient enclosure design gives customers that all-important competitive edge.
While housings from the established Fibox product range are utilised wherever possible to minimise costs, the company is always ready to develop bespoke enclosures to meet the demands of the application. These enclosures can be fabricated from polycarbonate, ABS or glass-reinforced polyester and supplied in various shapes and sizes. Moreover, styles and colour finishes can be provided to meet corporate identity designs and protocols.
But being able to deliver this level of service - responding to clients' design briefs, supporting them through the design exercise and offering the benefits of past experience wherever appropriate - requires a rather special manufacturing and stockholding infrastructure. That's why, earlier this year, Fibox invested substantial sums in a brand new, purpose built European hub facility, to support its growing European OEM customer base.
Now with a substantial centralised stockholding and advanced online customising facilities, the company now has the capability to produce bespoke enclosures that involve minor variations from the standard model, almost immediately. This new operation, which is based in Germany, is structured to provide a perfect logistical base from which the company can communicate effectively with its customers and ensure rapid product delivery.
In the last decade, the design of electrical and electronic enclosures has undergone a series of innovations in terms of materials of construction that have allowed increased use of non-metal electrical enclosures across a much wider range of industrial applications. Add to this the needs of modern assembly operations - speedier wiring and enclosure population plus faster, easier installation - and it is clear why plastic enclosures have a much greater role to play in those extreme environments that were once entirely dominated by metal.
The largest area of growth for Fibox has been in taking the burden of simple assembly away from customers and doing it in-house. Such 'value-added' work ranges from something as simple as fitting a few cable glands and terminals, to tasks as complicated as installing membrane keypads, PCBs and internal components such as DIN rails, connectors and supporting metalwork. Fibox even supplies its customers with enclosures that are fully populated, branded and boxed ready for direct onward shipment to the next link in the supply chain.
So, if you choose to work with Fibox, you can count on a company that will offer you a really comprehensive choice of high-performance enclosure products and one of the most competitive service offerings from the industry.