EAST PROVIDENCE, RI – For a change, the politician wasn’t the butt of the joke, just the teller.
 
At EFD Inc.’s open house last Friday, Rhode Island Governor Don Carcieri took to the podium and noted how years ago, as head of Cookson, he tried to buy his smaller competitor. When it comes to solder paste, Carieri beamed, EFD is “clearly the best in the world.”
  

Carcieri was one of several dignitaries on hand Friday to watch as EFD officially opened its new factory and headquarters here. The 116,000 sq. ft. building houses the company’s solder paste and dispensing manufacturing operations, and 232 employees.
 
Besides being welcomed by the former head of a competitor, another notable twist came when the company turned not to its founder, president or other dignitaries assembled, but to its longest-tenured employee, Laurie Higgins, to cut the ribbon.
 
The plant itself, the site of the former American Power Conversion building, has been remodeled and cast as a state-of-the-art production and warehousing facility.
 
The engineering lab features a semiautomatic printer and a Conceptronic HVN seven-zone reflow oven. Testing equipment includes a new environmental chamber.
 
Paste is produced on a built-to-order basis in small batches in one of 10 mixers. All product in North America is direct-ship. Mixing operations will soon be established in Asia as well, noted application engineering supervisor John Vivari. Paste makes up about 10 to 15% of total sales, the company said. Another growth area is contract packaging, where customer will send 55 gal. drums of material to EFD, which in turn will extract the material and dispense it into smaller, labeled cartridges.
 
The company emphasizes step-by-step product inspection to ensure consistency and reliability. During tip assembly, for example, a minimum of five inspections is performed. All measuring devices and scopes are non-contact, to prevent handling damage. And 100% of incoming materials undergo inspection.
 
EFD is heavy on Lean operations, which are now in their fourth year. The factory is heavy on visuals, with countless bulletin boards and colored stock cards. Several cross-functional teams and the Phase Gate process are employed to help eliminate decision-making hurdles during product development. According to Rhonda Mitchell, at any given time, the company has 10 to 15 products in development.