Officials and employees with Flexan, LLC participated in ribbon-cutting ceremonies today, officially marking the move for the contract manufacturer’s global headquarters to north suburban Lincolnshire. The move continues FMI’s expansion in response to growth in the silicone contract manufacturing market for medical devices.
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The relocation into the new 70,000-sq.-ft. building on Bond St. in Lincolnshire is about 25 minutes away from its previous Elk Grove facility, where the business operated three buildings in a combined 22,000 square feet.
The new site, celebrated today with a picnic, tours and town hall meeting for 250-plus employees, operates in a 20,000-sq.-ft. Class 7 clean room, nearly quadrupling in size from its previous location. FMI is a subsidiary of Chicago-based Flexan LLC, which also operates a 65,000-sq.-ft. facility in Chicago focused on custom molded rubber manufacturing.
“Lincolnshire is the perfect location for us; it had everything that we needed,” said CEO Jim Fitzgerald. “It’s convenient to both O'Hare and Chicago Executive Airports, it’s near a major rail line, and its proximity to major highways should help provide a reasonable commute for our employees.”
Fitzgerald added that Lake County’s wealth of medical equipment manufacturers was an added bonus. “Flexan, LLC will fit in nicely as the area is home to about 700 medical device and tooling companies, with some 50 medical-related corporate headquarters and an estimated 20,000 employees,” he said.
In addition to consolidating its operations from three buildings to now operating under one roof, Mike Huiras, Vice President of Sales and Marketing, said the firm simply needed more space. The new building will be able to house all of FMI's existing equipment, 100 employees and still have room left to add more capacity.
"As we were looking to add capabilities, and with the success with a number of projects that are upcoming, we realized we've outgrown our space," he said. "To facilitate and enhance our ability to continue to grow and serve customers, we knew we had to move to a new location."
FMI already plans to break into the silicone extrusion space with the addition of three new lines centered around silicone tubing. The firm currently operates about 40 silicone molding lines that primarily focus on precision molded silicone components for tight tolerance applications—like components for pacemakers, defibrillators and long-term implantables.
Earlier this year, Flexan, LLC acquired Salt Lake City-based MEDRON, which offers a range of outsourcing services, including high-volume manufacturing, customer private label capability, design engineering, product development and prototyping. Flexan, LLC also has facilities in China offering both industrial and medical capabilities.
About Flexan
Since 1946, Flexan, LLC is a global manufacturer of custom, high-precision silicone, rubber, and thermoplastic components for a broad array of product and industry applications, primarily used in medical devices but including hearing technology, miniature pneumatics, industrial controls, and aerospace and defense industries, among others. Flexan, LLC markets its products under the FMI, Flexan, and MEDRON brands. The FMI and MEDRON brands delivers cleanroom manufactured, assembled, and packaged silicone, and thermoplastic molded components for use in implantable Class III and disposable Class II and Class I medical devices. The Flexan brand is synomous with custom molding and expertise with molding difficult geometries as well as with bonding rubber to metal and other substrates, delivering high-precision, niche parts to a range of industries. Flexan (Suzhou) Precision Rubber Products, Ltd. is a wholly foreign owned entity in China . Suzhou manufactures products for both FMI and Flexan. Flexan, LLC sells its products worldwide and is headquartered in Lincolnshire, IL.
