DDi Corp.’s move to a new headquarters down the street from its current eight-building campus in Anaheim is intended to help the company churn out circuit boards more quickly and efficiently.
The company recently closed on a purchase of the $7.5 million property, situated along the 91 Freeway in the Canyon business district. Officials expect to move in by the end of the third quarter, when a lease expires on the company’s home of more than 30 years.
The 96,000-square-foot building it will occupy is equipped with “clean rooms” for lab work and testing, filtration and heating, ventilating and cooling systems, built-out lab space and staff offices.
“Good for Business”
“The new building will be much better utilized,” Chief Executive Mikel Williams said. “It’s going to be good for business.”
DDi makes circuit boards that later are assembled with chips.
The boards go inside equipment for aerospace, military, industrial, medical, networking and communication uses.
DDi built its name in the industry by turning around boards quickly, especially on prototypes.
Most of the company’s orders are completed in less than 10 days, sometimes within 24 hours.
It has an ever-changing roster of customers and has positioned itself as more flexible and nimble than most of its competitors in the crowded field.
No single company accounted for more than 5% of DDi’s revenue of $263.3 million in 2011, down 1.6% from a year earlier.
About a third of DDi’s business is in aerospace and defense. DDi’s Anaheim operation specializes in high-tech manufacturing and carved a niche over the years for handling complex and time-sensitive jobs.
But having materials and equipment housed in eight different buildings to complete an order has been “less than ideal for the high-tech products we build,” Williams said.
“I’m eager to improve our manufacturing facility and this gives us better capabilities,” he added.
Some 350 people work in Anaheim, and retaining employees was an important factor in choosing a new headquarters, according to Williams.
DDi’s other manufacturing operations are in Milpitas; Virginia; Ohio; Colorado; and Canada. It also has a data center in Texas.
Other Operations
The company has relocated other operations in recent years.
In 2007 it moved part of its Northern California operation to Anaheim, and consolidated two operations in Toronto in 2010.
“It’s a lot of work but when it’s done it’s worth it,” Williams said.
The company will save some cash in the long run as well, as its current lease near La Palma Avenue costs more than $800,000 annually with upkeep.
• Headquarters: Anaheim
• Business: circuit-board maker
• Founded: 1978
• Ticker symbol: DDIC (Nasdaq)
• Market value: about $226.6 million
• Notable: Known for its quick turnaround on customers’ projects
For its new headquarters DDi is taking over a building from Multi-Fineline Electronix Inc., which put the property up for sale late last year.
Multi-Fineline, better known as M-Flex, makes flexible printed circuit boards for cell phones, smart phones, barcode scanners and other mobile devices.
The company has been based in Anaheim since its start in 1984 and is looking to relocate within Orange County, a spokesperson told the Business Journal last October.
China
The relocation plans come as M-Flex puts a bigger emphasis on its growing operations in China.
In June, the company opened two plants there: a circuit board plant in Suzhou, near Shanghai; and an assembly facility for finished circuit boards in Chengdu.
The two facilities have a combined 900,000 square feet of space.
M-Flex once produced much of its circuit boards at its Anaheim headquarters, which still does prototypes and more complex jobs.
M-Flex has about 80 workers in Anaheim, down from 500 in 2006.
It opened its first China plant in the mid-1990s and opened another there in 2003.
The company now employs about 16,000 people, with a bulk of those workers in China.
