''THEY say you can tell geology technicians by their hands. They've
got no fingers left. They've literally worn them away.'' The speaker is
not a geologist. Not even one of these fingerless white coats,
sacrificing digits in a lifetime's painstaking hand polishing of rock
samples.
But Russ (Russell) Owens is managing director of a company which
designs and manufactures state-of-the-art machines which are,
increasingly, replacing ''hand prep'' in the production of geological
samples and, in the process, saving countless fingers from being rubbed
away in the lab.
The machines apply established engineering principles to what was once
a black art. The computerised annular saws and lapping and polishing
machines are not just useful to the geologist slicing up rock into thin
sections for microscopic analysis. They are also essential in the
preparation of the more exotic semiconductor materials like gallium
arsenide and cadmium telluride used in specialised, high performance
integrated circuits; in electro-optics, where precise geometric
tolerances are needed in substrate materials like lithium niobate; and
in optics itself, where devices like infra-red windows, laser rods and
fibre optics all require precision finishing.
The machines can also be used to produce thin bone and teeth samples.
To produce the final polish on magnetic recording heads. In many other
ways.
Some of the best machines of this type produced anywhere in the world
are made, literally, on the banks of the Clyde, in the shadow of the
Erskine bridge, by a company called Logitech. It exports more than 90%
of its production and can boast equipment operating in 59 countries.
Recently the Chinese, world leaders in the development of new ranges of
organic electro-optic materials, have been enthusiastic buyers of
Logitech kit.
To make its devices, Logitech brings together a diverse range of
skills from traditional precision metal machining -- to create
components like the polishing jigs -- to electronic control systems that
will finish your sample precisely to the nearest chosen micron then
switch the machine off.
Logitech sells more than machines. Its commitment to technology
transfer extends to providing familiarisation courses, on its own
premises, for technicians who will use them. Rarely a week goes by, says
Owens, without between two and five operators from clients around the
world, visiting Old Kilpatrick for an intensive training course.
The company is unusual in a number of ways. It is one of an
increasingly rare but valuable breed, a Scottish company that actually
makes a finished product for which there is a growing worldwide demand
-- not a component supplier. Not dependent on the vagaries of someone
else's order book for sales. In the jargon, an OEM (original equipment
manufacturer) of our very own.
Logitech is also an example of how Scottish academic expertise can be
put to commercial advantage. An early spin-off from an academic campus,
it was formed back in 1965 by staff from Glasgow University's electrical
and electronic engineering department. It is also, just to complicate
the story a little more, one of the few Scottish companies now owned by
Danish interests.
Logitech is also determinedly low profile. I came across it through
its participation in a Materials for Advantage programme mounted by
Dunbartonshire Enterprise. That pilot programme laudably tries to assist
compa
nies working with materials -- a portmanteau term for everything from
polymers and ceramics to the semiconductor exotics, materials that
will shape our technological future -- to expand their product range
and exploit fresh market opportunities.
But why, I asked Owens and his development manager Max Robertson, does
a company like Logitech, with sales in 59 markets, from Japan and the
United States to Papua New Guinea, feel the need to participate in such
programmes? Because we were asked, comes the initial reply. ''We are, by
definition, in a niche market,'' adds Max Robertson. ''That means it is
of restricted size. So we are always looking for assistance in
identifying new business opportunities in our sector.''
Owens, who has been with Logitech since 1975, having arrived from
Babcock, is enthusiastic about the exercise with his local LEC. It has,
he explains, given Logitech an analytical tool through which various
options for expanding the business into related sectors could be
properly assessed. From that process, two options have emerged as
genuine runners.
One, he believes, can be accommodated within Logitech's existing
resources, with some sympathetic support from its Danish parent. The
other, a more major project, would require some serious new money.
Whether that can be found is still an open question.
''Overall it's been a good exercise,'' says Owens. ''These projects
could significantly increase our market size,'' adds Robertson. Down the
years Logitech has made good use
of the various government schemes to assist company growth and
technical innovation.
Now, by an odd twist of its last change of ownership, a year ago,
which makes Logitech part of an international group with a total of 3000
employees, the company no longer qualifies for many of the UK Government
assistance schemes which have seen it grow from a four-person business
when Owens joined to the 40-strong business it is today.
Logitech's roots lie in research being carried out at Gilmorehill in
the 1960s into advanced semiconductor materials. One of the academics
involved, Bob Wilson, led the spin-off, which originally found a home in
Alexandria. It was still small when Owens joined a decade later, but had
diversified into serving the geological market as well.
In 1980, it moved to its present site, near the north terminal of the
old Erskine ferry. Within three or four years, the building doubled in
size. In June 1988, Bob Wilson, who had been winding down his interest
over a period, sold control of the company to the Danish Struers group.
Struers was active in a related technology, metallography -- the
production of polished thin sections of metal for microscopic
examination. ''A market 10 times the size of ours, but working at less
demanding tolerances,'' explains Robertson, who had arrived in 1987 from
a career in the motor industry and, latterly, with the laser and optics
division of Ferranti in Dundee.
The takeover may have cost Logitech its independence, but it gave it
access to a network of sister companies in the United States, Europe and
Asia which could handle the local sales and marketing effort and local
after-sales support. These days the group makes and sells around 200
systems a year. The market breaks down roughly 30% geological users, 70%
semiconductor and other sectors. Customers are predominately research
institutes, academic institutions, and the R&D centres of major
commercial companies. It is, by all accounts, a formidable customer
list.
Not long after Struers -- market listed, but still effectively family
controlled -- got into some difficulties of its own and was eventually,
a year ago, taken over by Radiometer, another Danish company,
specialising in the manufacture of medical analysers.
The relationship is, says Owens, very arm's length. He reports to
quarterly board meetings. Otherwise, his task is to get on with running
and developing Logitech. But the purchase of Struers by Radiometer has
pushed the worldwide employee headcount well over the 500 threshold
beyond which companies do not qualify for most forms of financial
assistance from the UK Government.
No matter how autonomous the Old Kilpatrick operation may be, the
rules are fixed. For a 40-strong satellite of a Danish parent,
pre-eminent in its own technical niches, but conscious that a presence
in a few more niches would add immeasurably to the comfort factor, that
poses some challenges.
The good thing is that, through its business development team and its
Materials for Advantage programme, Dunbartonshire Enterprise has been
able to map out a rational expansion programme with Logitech, helping it
identify the right new niche markets the company should go for. The
question is whether we should also have in place financial support
structures flexible enough to make the second stage of the process --
implementation -- readily achievable.
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