Framingham, N.H. firms ink deal to deliver parts to key defense contractors
Courtesy of Monzite Corp.
A Monzite Corp. employee works on a microassembly project. Monzite and Framingham-based eComp this week announced they will collaborate in order to deliver hard-to-find electronics to the defense sector.
The U.S. military possesses the most advanced defense technology in the world —hence the superpower status —but many of the designs of major military machines such as ships, fighter jets and submarines are decades old.
These vehicles are built to last a lifetime, even a century, in the case of the Boeing B-52 Bomber Aircraft, which was rolled out in the 1950s, said Richard Nadeau, president and founder of Framingham-based eComp, a distributor of electronic components, largely for the defense and aerospace industries.
But though these machines are very sophisticated, it’s often difficult for the contractors that build them to find the necessary parts to repair and build new ones. That’s where a company like eComp comes in.
Nashua firm to design and build, eComp to distribute
This week, eComp and Nashua, N.H.-based Monzite Corp. announced a multi-year collaboration that the companies say will better position them to serve the defense and aerospace industries, as well as the medical and industrial marketplace, which often require hard-to-find parts for what Nadeau called “legacy products.”
While eComp specializes in sourcing these products, Monzite has the capability to re-engineer, build and test new parts to military standards, according to Nadeau. eComp will act as a distributor for Monzite under the agreement.
Counterfeiting considerations
This provides contractors an alternative to purchasing electronic parts off the unofficial “gray market,” which Nadeau said is rife with counterfeit parts, many of which are coming out of China and run the risk of causing problems with quality.
“When you are serving the military, you have to be absolutely sure that the components you are putting into systems are authentic and work as designed,” Nadeau said.
Monzite’s ability to engineer parts that are no longer available because they’re so dated is key, too. Sometimes, such parts cannot even be found on the gray market. That was the case with the first project Monzite and eComp worked on together, according to David Robbins, Monzite’s CEO. His company was able to reengineer an electronic chip for an eComp customer and is now building and testing it to military standards, he said in a statement.
“Serving these industries together is a great fit for us,” Robbins said. “eComp is well known and respected as a sourcing and authentication house, and at Monzite we have the experience and capabilities to build and test microelectric components for demanding environments.”
(Note: This story was updated to further clarify that eComp is a distributor of electronics for the defense and medical sectors.)
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