INSTALLATION UNDER WAY AT FUBA TUNISIA

Installation of the two PAL machines, ordered by Fuba Printed Circuits Tunisia at last year’s Productronica, is now under way at the Fuba factory just outside Tunis. The Pattern Plate and Desmear/PTH/Panel line join three other PAL lines installed at Fuba Tunisia some nine years ago.

“My colleague Mr Ajmi went to Hong Kong for the final buy off of the machines, accompanied by Mr Hivon of Shipley, France and Mr Di Marco from STS and were pleased with what they saw,” explained Mr Slim Sellami, Managing Director of Fuba Printed Circuits Tunisia, a joint venture partner company of VOGT Electronic Fuba GmbH and a specialist producer of double sided boards for a wide range of industries.

“Now we are hard at work installing the machines and look forward to them being fully commissioned by end of October 2002. We have opted to use our own engineers, working under PAL’s supervision, so our people acquire an intimate knowledge of the lines. We believe that this will prove extremely valuable.

“The new machines are needed to cope with added demand from our clients, who include Bosch, Schneider Electric, Delphi, Siemens, Alcatel, Jabil, Magneti Marelli… as well as an increasing group of contract manufacturers who are benefiting from the outsourcing trend in PCB procurement. Even when many parts of the world have been experiencing somewhat depressed times we have been extremely busy here in Tunisia – and long may it continue!”

Fuba Tunisia’s clients value the company’s commitment to quality – Fuba has ISO 9002, QS 9000, ISO 14001 and ISO TS 16949 certifications – and their continuous investment programme. “We have made substantial investments as we strongly believe that an important market recovery lies ahead in the medium term”, said Mr Sellami.

“Our ambition is to continue building up one of the biggest double sided capacity serving the European market, with the objectives of continuous improvement of our competitiveness along with consolidation of existing markets in France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland as well as penetration of new market regions.

"We selected PAL lines because of their excellent technical support in the design phase, and their ability to fulfil our requests and satisfy our needs. Our existing PAL machines have produced work of a superb quality and we look forward to equally good results from the new machines. Prior to placing the order with PAL we had been talking with them and STS, their representatives, for a couple of years about the possibility of placing an order – by last November the time proved right, and we were delighted to be able to finalise the order and take part in the signing ceremony at Productronica 2001.”

More on Fuba Tunisia at www.fuba-pctn.com