Duotec reaps the benefits of its labour
In 2022, Turck duotec GmbH became simply Duotec. But over the past few years, a lot more than a simple name change has happened at the German manufacturer. Evertiq took the opportunity to talk about growth, investment and the future with the EMS provider.
Looking back at 2022, Duotec general manager and CSO, Philip Mirliauntas, tells Evertiq that considering all the challenges of the year, it has been a positive year – both in regards to the company’s growth and solutions.
“Despite of those positive effects of course the supply chain has been a challenge. We always found a solution, but with a lot of effort and a lot of resources. We don’t know how it will go further, but at the end of the day we all feel that we have a little relief of the allocation, but not the big relief yet.”
Duotec is an EMS provider, but also a developer of sensor solutions and products, which in many ways makes the company a bit of an oddity among traditional EMS providers. Through its fabsolutions offering the company focuses on its electronics manufacturing services. Via its research-related LabFab the company offers EMS related prototype services. It’s what comes after this that makes Duotec step outside of the normal EMS space. sensesolutions merge sensor technology and connectivity into product and platform solutions – the company’s own developed products and solutions which essentially makes this an ODM service. And then there's nextsolutions, which focuses on next-gen innovations and disruptive technologies. This is where the company invests in startups and acts as a strategic investor providing knowledge and expertise on the industrialisation process.
There has been a lot of movement from Duotec in a very short time. Back in late 2020, the duotec group acquired a majority stake in EMS provider ml&s manufacturing, logistics and services GmbH (ml&s). An acquisition that added more than 500 and an industrial campus of around 100,000 square metres to the Duotec group.
During 2021, the company kept investing in start-ups, broadened its workforce and invested further in its manufacturing technologies as well as in basic research and the development of microelectronics. This is also when the research-related LabFab was set up at the Halver site.
Earlier in 2022, duotec and the ESCHA Group expanded with new manufacturing capacities in Central Europe. The two companies jointly acquired 49% of SVI Hungary Kft. from the SVI Group. At the time of this announcement, it also became clear that the companies aim to take over the remaining 51% over the next two years.
Looking forward to 2023, Philip Mirliauntas says that there is an opportunity for growth, very much due to the company’s target industries. But the biggest challenge for the next year will remain the allocation situation, something Mr. Mirliauntas is sure of.
