OAKLAND – Dell has announced it plans to triple the amount of product recovered from customers by the end of 2009 and released its annual sustainability report outlining current progress and future goals for the company’s corporate responsibility efforts.

The company’s environmental design plans were laid out in a new report. Other major goals include:

• Introduction of a new supplier audit tool to help ensure good workplace practices throughout the company’s supply chain.
• Global compliance with the RoHS directive.
• Enhanced product energy efficiency through improvements in product design; and
• Tripling the recovery and recycling of retired computers by the end of 2009.  

Dell’s annual sustainability report for fiscal year 2006, which ended Feb. 3, outlines the company’s progress on environmental and social measurements and was issued today in conjunction with the Coalition of Environmentally Responsible Economies (Ceres) conference here. 

Major achievements for the company’s recently completed fiscal year include:

·         Launch of the company’s first high-volume, RoHS-compliant¹ desktop motherboards. Dell exceeded its goal of shipping three million of these motherboards per quarter by the fourth quarter of 2005.

·         Recovery of 36.1 million kgs of product for reuse or recycling from customers and company operations.  More than half of this total came from customers, increasing Dell’s recovery of product from customers by 72% over fiscal year 2005 volumes.

·         Completion of Dell’s Supplier Self Assessment Questionnaire by 90% of targeted suppliers, exceeding the goal of 50% of target group completing self-assessment.

Earlier this year, Dell issued a chemical-use policy that set forth a plan to phase out the use of all brominated flame retardants in desktop, notebook and server plastic parts. Dell also plans to expand its existing ban on the use of brominated flame retardants in other products and peripherals developed after June 1, 2006.

In 2005 Dell shipped more than 8.4 million RoHS-compliant, Pb-free desktop motherboards. 

Dell increased product recovered from customers for reuse or recycling, as measured by weight, by 72% over 2005. Dell has set a target to recover 125 million kilograms cumulatively by the end of 2009, nearly three times as much as Dell recovered this year.

Dell plans to launch customer product recovery services in Latin America and China this year. 

A copy of the company’s sustainability report is available at dell.com/sustainabilityreport.

 

Shanghai -- Assembléon, a subsidiary of Royal Philips Electronics, and Yamaha IM are extending their pick-and-place partnership for another three years. The agreement covers the global SMD placement market, and includes development, manufacturing, marketing, sales and service. 
 
The cooperation began in 1987, when Assembléon launched the companies' first mutual product, the CSM46. Since then, the partnership has been extended with continuous cooperation. 
 
Together, Assembléon and Yamaha have grown to be the top supplier of pick-and-place machines worldwide in terms of units.
 
"Together, our two companies have the economies-of-scale and technical expertise that electronics assembly operations worldwide can rely on," added Leon Husson, CEO of Assembléon. "With today's PCBs characterized by continued miniaturization and a widening component mix, the winners in the market will be the manufacturers who can make their machines future proof, while still delivering a cost-down, quality-up process."

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