Hitec Helps Thomas Swan Light Up the Modern World

Light emitting diodes, or LED's, light up our modern lives. Whether it's our mobile phones, our DVD players or even our car taillights, there is a good chance that LED's play an important part in the technology we use every day.

Cambridge company Thomas Swan Scientific Equipment develops and manufactures the technology that makes LED's possible. From an embryonic research organisation Thomas Swan has become a world leader in this field with a UK turnover of £25 million and a team of 70 people.

"Thomas Swan is very much an example of Cambridge based research being transformed into a commercial entity," said Roger Hunter, Managing Director of Thomas Swan.



"The company originally made systems for research organisations but today we also supply very high value systems to manufacturers in countries such as Taiwan, Japan, Korea and China. At this time, we have about a 70% share of the worldwide market in this type of technology."

The key technology behind Thomas Swan's success is the manufacturing equipment that is able to form the 'Gallium Nitride' wafers that are essential for LED production. A central component within each system is a highly complex mechanical assembly called a 'showerhead', which is machined with a matrix of 16000 finely positioned holes. The value of each machine is reflected in the fact that they may only ship 35 systems each year.


"We are shipping very high value, low volume products," said Roger. "I think this is where UK engineering is at its best, applying our expertise and knowledge to high end technology."



Roger Hunter, MD of Thomas Swan and John Stevenson MD of Hitec

Thomas Swan is expecting much further growth in the LED sector in future years. This growth will be driven by the sale of flat panel LCD screens where the LED's are used in large numbers to back-light the screen, and also the increased use in automotive lighting systems, traffic signaling systems and mobile phones.

For Thomas Swan, the future certainly looks bright, as it does for its suppliers also. Externally engineered components form a large proportion of each system. Thomas Swan outsources a great deal of work to local engineering companies in the Cambridge region.

"A few years back we made the decision to outsource much of the mechanical engineering expertise," said Roger.

"It has many commercial advantages to have this kind of expertise available locally; to call on when needed, rather than trying to maintain it in house. With a supplier company such as Hitec, we get a very responsive service that is capable of delivering the high quality components we require, in the tight timescales we often have to work within. This strategy has worked well for us."

Hitec Sheet Metal, based in Soham, specialise in providing racking systems, small and large format enclosures and precision engineered components to the technology sector. Hitec have been providing sheet metal engineering services to Thomas Swan for many years.
"We've been very grateful for the engineering work that Thomas Swan's technology brings into this region," said John Stevenson of Hitec.

"The UK engineering sector is enjoying a welcome recovery and much of this is down to companies like Thomas Swan, who value the quality, flexibility and responsiveness of local engineering companies such as ourselves.

 Thomas Swan is a very impressive company and we are pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to their success."

A part of Thomas Swan's future strategy is to further improve and develop their outsourcing capability to enable fast and rapid responses to market changes and to help introduce new products to the marketplace. With the anticipated growth in the LED market and Thomas Swan's commitment to outsourcing locally, this can only be good news for the Cambridge engineering sector.


For more details on Thomas Swan visit www.thomasswan.co.uk