Getac Inc., a local maker of rugged computers, moved last week to Irvine from Lake Forest to handle its expanding sales.
Getac added about 10,000 square feet of space for a total of about 28,000 in a move to an office in the Irvine Spectrum, where it has 50 workers, after seeing sales double this year.
“We outgrew our space in Lake Forest as business has picked up quite a bit over the past two years,” Chief Executive Jim Rimay said.
Getac flirted with moving its U.S. headquarters near Washington, D.C., where the company has many government customers.
“We came fairly close to moving to D.C. since we spend a lot of time in that area,” Rimay said. “But we find that Irvine has a great (pool) of technical talent, and we’ve been pretty happy with the talent base here.”
The company opted to open a small sales office near Washing-ton Dulles International Airport in Virginia and keep its U.S. headquarters here.
Getac’s parent company is Taiwan’s Getac Technology Corp., which last year changed its name from Mitac Technology Corp.
The parent company sees some $650 million in yearly sales and has about 17,000 workers in all.
Its global headquarters in Hsinchu, Tai-wan, houses research, development and pro-duct design.
The Irvine office does final assembly and customization.
Workers there configure the computers, load them with software and test them. It’s also where Getac has tech support, sales and marketing.
Getac Technology—which is publicly traded on the Taiwan Stock Exchange—is itself part of Mitac Synnex Group.
Getac Technology doesn’t break out U.S. sales but has said the U.S. is its biggest market.
Getac makes what’s known as “ruggedized” mobile computers for the military, emergency workers, firefighters and police officers. They are also used by utility workers, inventory trackers in warehouses and delivery fleets.
Some are standard laptop size, while others are small handheld devices and tablet PCs.
All of them go for two to three times what a regular computer would sell for.
Tough Machines
The computers are surrounded by a hard, thin shell made of a magnesium alloy. All of the seams are sealed so that water, dirt and air can’t get in. Getac says its computers can withstand high temperatures, jostling around, being dropped and even a spray from a hose.
Inside, the machines have specially-mounted disk drives that protect the delicate parts of the drive from shocking blows.
A few years ago Getac shifted from being a maker of computers for others’ brands to selling under its own brand name through a network of resellers.
It competes with Panasonic Corp., which has the biggest share of the market with its rugged “toughbooks,” and No. 2 General Dynamics Itronix Corp.
Getac’s sales doubled in 2009, according to Rimay.
“Next year we have a pretty aggressive plan, and we anticipate the growth rate to continue,” he said.
Getac has been gaining market share in the past two years for a couple of reasons.
For one, the company is able to sell its products at up to 20% less than competitors because it owns nearly all of the pieces of the supply chain—from manufacturing the hard shells to the light-emitting diodes in the screen.
Getac buys processor chips and drives from other suppliers.
Customized
Unlike Panasonic’s, Getac’s machines are highly customized.
“Price and customization are our competitive edge,” Rimay said. “Panasonic doesn’t do any customization. You have to take it as it is.”
For the Army Special Forces, Getac has built encrypted radios that communicate with planes into computers.
It also has made computers with global positioning systems and special night-vision filters in their screens.
A big part of the customization is making the computers meet high-level security requirements.
“We have coded encryptions that go into the hard drive, so they can be locked by the user or an outside administrator,” Rimay said. “If it’s stolen, (the data) won’t be able to be accessed.”
Getac has been growing as cash-strapped companies look to invest in computers for their workers that will last more than a year or two.
“In servicing the commercial markets, the economy is taking a toll,” Rimay said. “They aren’t able to refresh their computers so they are required to use their tools longer.”
Some of Getac’s customers expect to use their computers for “four or five” years, Rimay said.
Getac got its start in 1989 as a venture with Mitac’s defense business and GE Aerospace, the jet engine unit of General Electric Co. that’s now called GE Aviation.
The company first came to Orange County when it moved to Lake Forest from Fremont in 1994.
