SAN FRANCISCO -- Fabrinet will build a new product introduction center in California in response to demand for assembly operations closer to customer engineering, the EMS firm announced this week. 

"Discussions with customers for some period of time have made it clear that they would like us to have something a little bit closer to their engineering capabilities, to do some of the earlier-stage stuff in terms of alpha and beta, and doing those sort of early-stage production runs for them in a place where the engineers would have the capability to be a little bit more hands-on and a more real-time basis," said John Marchetti, chief strategy officer.

The firm did not disclose where or when the plant would be built, other than it will be in California.

The firm will continue to ramp production to its production plants in Thailand, the company said on a conference call. 

The site will initially be used to satisfy optical communications customers but is expected to serve a broader range of customers in the future.

• Prev
• Next