Defond visit – Juan's team

Defond visit – Juan's team

by Team A (Juan, Keith, Lucy, Alexi)

Defond? You probably never heard of it, but you would have used their products one way or the other.

The Defond Group was founded in 1978 by two brothers, who are both engineers, and is a leading supplier of electro-mechanical modules and switches.

Defond was the best organised site we visited during the trip. The long-term relationship building was reflected, starting from the greeting we received at the factory gate to the lunch they hosted.

All students were individually addressed by a name tag along with where we work, showing how much they valued us as an individual and also a prospect customer or partner.

During the presentation, what we were impressed with most was the wide range of products they offer, ranging from switches in kettles to switches in Bentleys.

Also impressive is how diverse their customer bases are -- no single customer represents more than 5% of their total revenue.

Defond operates in a complete vertical integration business model, which offered flexibility for their business needs.

Lean operation was put in place earlier last year and has been deployed in stages, but was well set up in all sites that we visited.

Apart from process improvement, quality control was seen throughout although the level varies based on the component produced. For example, at one site we saw a particularly sign at each station saying that the material needs to be disposed if they are dropped on the ground.

The quality is the key to the business, as said by General Manager.

A famous Chinese saying is that there is a great woman behind every successful man. Defond is the woman behind hundreds and thousands of successful men, and a brand we will probably never forget!