Every manufacturer aims to achieve the golden triangle of production, with cost control, high quality, and faster delivery forming the three equal sides. But while this idea seems straightforward in theory, the siloed nature of several critical manufacturing steps makes it difficult to implement in real-world production settings. To address the elephant in the room, manufacturing firms have to collaborate with multiple vendors –– which tends to be expensive and often causes hurdles in maintaining the overall production budget and schedule.

Westfall Technik has built a strategically integrated portfolio of design, prototyping, tooling, molding, and production sites with a vision to make the elusive golden triangle a reality for its clients. This proprietary Stacked Integration Model enables the company to leverage a high degree of specialization, extensive capacities in both production and assembly, and first-class references in high-end manufacturing. Westfall Technik aims to leverage the synergistic networking of expertise and leading-edge technologies to create processes of maximum efficiency and intelligent solutions that go beyond the standard production line. “Our stacked integration model enables us to provide reliably excellent quality, the greatest possible productivity, and efficiency, all the while maximizing cost-saving opportunities for manufacturers,” says Mark Gomulka, CEO of Westfall Technik.

A One-Stop Shop for Plastic Manufacturing

Currently, the company’s focus is on developing high-end manufacturing solutions for the production of plastic parts in the medical, packaging, and consumer goods arenas. Westfall Technik’s management team backs every customer engagement and has over 60 years of experience in the plastic industry and private enterprises. This veteran backing enables the company to effectively handle the R&D of new process techniques, coordinate complex projects, and efficiently monitor turnkey solutions designed to meet each client’s unique needs.

“Our customers can go from a napkin sketch of their idea to producing industry-grade prototypes and eventually high-volume production, all within Westfall’s extensive arsenal of specialized manufacturing competencies,” states Bob Sikonia, VP of tooling operations at Westfall Technik. At the heart of this ability to offer end-to-end plastic manufacturing solutions are the company’s vertically integrated partner network and seasoned team of plastic experts. Westfall Technik also prides itself on the engineering depth of all its production sites, including multiple state-of-the-art injection mold buildings and molding facilities. These site locations (Arizona, California, Connecticut, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, and North Carolina in the U.S., Ontario in Canada, Bavaria in Germany, and Kaiping in China.) are internationally aligned to deliver unmatched global reach in the industry and enhance Westfall Technik’s agility, scalability, and efficacy, regardless of the complexity of customer challenges.

Combining Expertise and Innovation to Deliver Excellence

From a portfolio standpoint, the company offers unparalleled tooling competencies powered by market-leading mold makers to deliver next-gen mold-flow analysis, hotrunner systems, fast lead times for prototype components, efficient automated manufacturing of tooling components and more.

This combined with Westfall Technik’s team of plastic experts and stacked integration model enables it to produce an end-to-end solution required in the healthcare and packaging arena. Alternatively, the company utilizes its injection molding capabilities in its tooling facilities to facilitate precise and rapid prototype development before a product is ready for full production. Tooling offerings include prototype, pilot tooling, side actions, complex part geometry, mold textures, insert molding, multi-shot, unscrewing, servo actions and over-molding. Westfall Technik’s prototyping offering allows for lower cost and quick Leadtime while ensuring impeccable evaluation of overall product function and moldability. Above all, the company inspects all parts at several levels of the overall production process to maintain part consistency and accuracy.

Another critical facet in the company’s broad portfolio of capabilities is its range of proprietary technology that it developed in collaboration with innovative partners under the Westfall Technik umbrella. The company’s current proprietary technologies include two major solutions: MHS hotrunner systems and the EcoCore advanced manufacturing platform. Westfall Technik’s patented hotrunner systems are designed to increase molding operations’ overall efficiency, reliability, and profitability by delivering measurable results that improve plastic part quality and reduce operating costs. The company has also developed its revolutionary M3 micro-molding solution that produces micro products without coldrunners.

Our customers can go from a napkin sketch of their idea to producing industry-grade prototypes and eventually high-volume production, all within Westfall’s extensive arsenal of specialized manufacturing competencies

“M3’s ability to develop micro parts without coldrunner systems significantly reduces resin usage, cycle time, and overall final product cost, which is critical when working with costly bio-absorbable resins,” adds Vijay Kudchadkar, director of advanced engineering at Westfall Technik. On the other hand, the proprietary EcoCore platform creates sustainable, insulated, vital, and durable packaging products for a wide range of highly regulated applications simply and cost-effectively.

A Culture of Customer-Centricity

Westfall Technik’s combination of innovation and expertise is backed by its highly methodical customer engagement process. For every client, the company spends time upfront to gain a deeper understanding of project-specific needs and assess their overall product requirements. Once this is completed, Westfall Technik chooses the appropriate site and best-suited team based on the knowledge and capabilities needed to meet all demands. The company then starts scheduling kickoff meetings wherein it meshes with customer teams and evaluates the scope of the final product’s application in the market.

On the back-end, Westfall Technik leverages its in-house ERP system to keep track of every step of a client’s project, be it design, tooling, prototyping, and more.

Alternatively, the company’s ERP also breaks down every process by the hour, tracks machine usage, staff availability, and key performance indicator (KPI) metrics to enhance alignment with the desired production schedule.

Highlighting the benefits of Westfall Technik’s portfolio of services is a customer success story where it helped a healthcare packaging firm enhance the efficiencies of its operations. Initially, as an organization serving the healthcare packaging market, the customer used coldrunner-based molding technologies to produce the required micro components. As a result, the cost of the final piece was exorbitantly high.

The client opted to use conventional hotrunner systems for their needs to mitigate this. Unfortunately, this approach failed miserably as the heat of hotrunners caused the resin material to degrade and hinder the controlled filling of parts. Once Westfall Technik got involved, the company leveraged its proprietary M3 technology and extensive tooling capabilities from its Minneapolis-Saint Paul facility (with tolerances up to 1/10th of a thou) to support the customer in developing a coldrunner-less micromolding process that delivered significant reductions in cycle time and procurement costs.

Future-Proofing the Plastic Manufacturing Arena

Founded in 2017 by Brian Jones, Westfall Technik’s vision was to create a company where customers can take their product ideas from initial concept through full scale production. In pursuit of realizing this vision, the company in recent years has acquired several innovative plastic manufacturing solutions and services vendors. “Since our founding, we have continually expanded our stacked integration model to become a fully rounded contract manufacturing company that de-risks time and costs by boosting the transparency across traditionally disparate processes,” asserts Merritt Williams, the chief commercial officer of Westfall Technik. The company plans to continue building on this established technology stack and penetrate additional geographic markets.

In a market where most companies shy away from complex plastic manufacturing problems, Westfall Technik is changing this paradigm with its ever-expanding vertical integration and deep industry expertise. In essence, by taking over every step of a client’s manufacturing process, Westfall Technik assists its customers in bypassing traditional stopgaps and genuinely achieving the unattainable golden triangle.