HSF Group to strengthen its<br>electronics manufacturing

HSF Group is the middle segment player within electronics manufacturing which now plans to enter the spotlight. "We got to be more visible on the market", Mr. Gunnar Bergström, CEO of HSF Group told evertiq. HSF Group had an annual turnover of approximately 50 million Euros in 2006. This year the company expect to increase its annual turnover to 75 million Euros. 80% of the turnover comes from customers on the Swedish market. The remaining 20% consists of customers from Germany, France, the United States, Finland and Norway. "Telecom, Industrial and Building are among our largest segments and we mainly focus on base station systems for telecom", Mr. Bergström said. HSF Group´s head office is in Stockholm, Sweden. HSF is specialised in manufacturing of complete systems. This includes complete manufacturing of mechanics, electronics and cables which all are produced and assembled in-house. A major part of the internal manufacturing is delivered to the system assembling. The remaining part of the sales includes EMS-services such as printed circuit board assembling. Most of the production is carried out in Tartu, Estonia, at HSF Group's subsidiary Tarkon. Tarkon recently invested in a new wave soldering machine to develop the company's local services in the area. However most of the electronics manufacturing is made at HSF Group's plant, former Flextronic´s plant, in Gotland Sweden. 530 of HSF Group's 720 employees are employed by Tarkon that produce system assemblies, wire harnesses, cold- and turret punsch stamping, milling, turning, electronics and support processes. HSF Medeto who specialises in Medical and complex assembling is also a subsidiary of HSF Group and are based in the same building as Tarkon. Elimag in Gothenburgh, Sweden, specialises in high speed machining and salt bath dip brazing of aluminium. HSF Group has focused on increasing capacity especially within electronics manufacturing. The company recently invested in a Siemens Siplace SMT line, and the company plans to focus more on SMT. "Today we have a Siemens line with a capacity of 36.000 components per hour, but we plan to invest for increased capacity", Mr. Bergström told evertiq. The growth within HSF Group during 2006 and 2007 is almost all organic. The group is looking stay ahead of the competition in terms of new technology capacity, however the company is currently not looking at any acquisitions, Mr. Bergström concluded.