Required Ventilation "unlocked" via web browser

Oliver Geisselhart

Karl Goll, Jakob Szekeresch, Werner Kreibl, Klaus Mang

Full house at ASYS Automation Systems GmbH in Dornstadt near Ulm: More than 250 customers and partners of the globally active company attended the 8th Technology Days in November. The ASYS Group is a leading manufacturer of handling, processing, and special machines for the electronics and solar industries. Among other things, the company produces machines for populating circuit boards, such as those used in computers, mobile phones, and also extensively in cars. The subsidiary "ASYS Process and Cleanroom Technology GmbH" has been part of the corporate group for 17 years.

The Technology Days are always an opportunity for the company to showcase new developments from all business areas in addition to a series of technical presentations, within a production hall converted into an exhibition area. "This wouldn't be possible at any other trade fair in such a concentration," said Werner Kreibl, who has been running the company together with Klaus Mang since its founding in 1992. The cleanroom division showcased, among other things, dry cabinets and laminar flow systems for use as cleanroom cabins to isolate a particle-free production area or as shielded workstations, e.g., for display assembly. Furthermore, ASYS Process and Cleanroom Technology also offers turnkey cleanrooms and dynamic storage systems with cleanroom technology.

The customers, according to Managing Director Karl Goll, come from electrical engineering sectors such as microelectronics, semiconductors, automotive, optics, aerospace, as well as from life sciences industries including chemistry, pharmaceuticals, medicine, biotechnology, and food. Geographically, they are distributed 70 percent in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and Scandinavia, 20 percent in France, Eastern Europe, Italy, and Greece, and 10 percent in Mexico, South Korea, USA, and South America, with the company able to draw on the existing sales network of the ASYS Group.

Karl Goll demonstrated the range of services of ASYS Process and Cleanroom Technology with two examples: In Seoul, South Korea, a multi-story dynamic storage system was built with a footprint of four by four meters and a height of 20 meters, where medical products are stored at a constant minus 20 degrees. When disruptions occurred due to a frozen valve, technicians in Germany were able to access the system via web browser and upload new software. "This saved us not only time but also a long and expensive trip," said Karl Goll.

For a company in the optical industry, ASYS built a 400-square-meter cleanroom in Germany for lens manufacturing. "It must be prevented that plasticizers outgas and deposit on the lenses," explained the managing director, which was achieved through the use of special activated carbon filters. After a two-week trial run, it was confirmed: "The outgassing test has been passed." Production is now underway.

With an annual turnover of six to seven million euros, the cleanroom division contributes only a few percent to the overall revenue of the ASYS Group, but the company is satisfied with its development. When Karl Goll joined the company a year after its founding, "we had just two employees." Now, there are 25, supported on a case-by-case basis by external personnel. ASYS does not specify growth targets for the cleanroom sector. "But we seize opportunities where we find them," said Werner Kreidl.