Brooks Instrument, a developer of precision fluid measurement and control technology, has opened a new manufacturing and engineering center in Korea to expand production of its mass flow controllers used extensively in semiconductor manufacturing.
The new facility, located in Yongin, Gyeonggi Province, significantly increases the company’s operational footprint in Korea. It includes a significantly larger Class 100 clean room manufacturing area, as well as increased space for engineering, service and sales support.
Brooks Instrument has operated in Korea for nearly 25 years. The company moved from its previous location in Korea to the larger Yongin facility to better serve the needs of the fast-growing semiconductor manufacturing sectors locally and throughout the Asia Pacific region.
“With the anticipated continued growth of the semiconductor industry, we wanted to relocate and expand our operations to provide increased local production capability, faster service and sales and applications engineering support,” said Hans Sundstrom, Global Semiconductor Business Unit Manager for Brooks Instrument.
The much larger facility will initially support production of the Brooks Instrument GF100 Series of mass flow controllers used in semiconductor and other critical gas flow control applications. The GF100 series is widely seen as the semiconductor industry thermal MFC standard for reliable, repeatable delivery of process gasses.
“Once the new production facility in Yongin reaches full scale, we will have increased our global production capacity by close to 30 percent,” Sundstrom said. “It will also serve as an additional location for manufacturing and parts inventory, complementing our facilities in the U.S. and Hungary, thereby further reducing the risk of a supply chain disruption for our customers.”
The Yongin facility will also improve the company’s ability to provide rapid repair, maintenance and calibration support to customers in the region. The facility staff includes applications engineers ready to assist customers with expert support and insight on how to integrate Brooks Instrument mass flow technology with specific applications and advanced processes.
Jason Lee, Korea Country Manager at Brooks Instrument, added, “By relocating closer to our customers, we will have increased opportunity for collaboration, be able to learn more about their unique challenges and work with them to further enhance our technology to better meet their current and future needs.”