Bantam finds strength in low numbers - Austin Business Journal:

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In the next room, a technician assembles a customized network-managementf device with the logo onthe box, while his colleaguee puts together another one that Wi-Fi servicew provider custom-configured for one of its "We're busting out at the seams here," Mike president and CEO of Bantajm Electronics Inc., says as he surveys the company'sw manufacturing floor and warehouse, which has recentlyg doubled in size to 30,000 square feet. The which employs about 50 at its plant on McHalew Court off ofBurnet Road, expects to continure to grow and is on the hunt for a new placed that will triple its current footprint by October 2008, Chaddoc k says.
Bantam, founded in the late 1960s as , for many yearas had focused on repairing computersand electronics. It also made its own line of persona computers and servers under the XCELOj brand name and ran a retail store sellingcomputer parts. The company still manufactures the XCELON gear and has kept the partsstore going. But its growth of late has come from its newfocusz area: providing custom-manufacturing services to technologyy companies.
The company has found its nichedproviding so-called "high-mix, low-volume," manufacturing services for companiesx that need a range of differenf products built in small says Chaddock, who took over Bantam about two year ago after heading Austin-based semiconductor startup and working for many years as a managefr at This year, Bantam is on pace to ring up roughly $20 million in sales, up from $15 million in 2004, Chaddock says. Bantam's ideakl customer is one that makes softwarde but not the hardware needed to make it Chaddock says.
It landed just such a customer last when data-storage outfit of Austin shifter its focus to software development and outsourced its manufacturinv to Bantam. Increasingly, U.S.-based technology companies that outsource productiohn are turning to contract manufacturers in Asia and othere overseas markets where labor costs are saysSteven Froehlich, an analyst at in Austin. That trene is likely to continue. But at the same time, deman is expected to continue forsmaller U.S. such as Bantam, that stand ready to turn out smaller runs ofproductzs quickly, Froehlich says.
"There will always be a placw for this niche where a companyhcan say, 'I need 1,000 of something, I need it done righg and I need it in three weeks,'" he says. "That'x how long it takes a boat to sail from The higher level of intimacythat smaller, U.S.-based manufacturers can have with theid customers also makes them appeakl to certain types of technologyg companies -- particularly those that are based Froehlich says. That's one reason Crossroadxs selected Bantam, Crossroads CEO Rob Sims "That way, you can influence the manufactured more effectively and managechangee quickly," he says.
"And if it makes sense to do the work withinbour community, then I thin that's the right approach."