Jan 09, 2017 
After more than two decades of sales management experience in the electronics assembly sector, Steve Giffen has been appointed New Business Sales Manager at Blakell Europlacer Distribution. Giffen joins the team to focus his expertise on a portfolio of products including the company’s own placement platform and screen printing ranges.
Until late 2015, Giffen had been with placement equipment company Mycronic for over eight years. Prior to that, he spent ten years with Exception EMS as New Business Manager for the contract manufacturer’s Fasttrack ‘Just In Time’ proposition, attracting major business from the MoD and aerospace companies as well as a large contract for the particle accelerator project at Cerne. In his New Business management role at Blakell Europlacer Distribution, Giffen will drive sales of Europlacer’s own pick & place technology and Speedprint printer platforms, as well as energising growth in the company’s distributed lines including automatic storage solutions, AOI, reflow, and board handling.
Giffen was appointed to the New Business role by Andy Jones, himself newly-promoted to the senior post of Business Development and UK Sales Manager at Europlacer. As a result, Giffen finally catches up with Jones: “Many years ago, Steve joined Mydata to fill the vacancy I left when moving to Europlacer,” explains Jones. “Now that he can work with us, I have no doubt that his arrival adds immense strength to the Europlacer distribution arm’s sales operations and management team.”
The Blakell Europlacer Group comprises the Speedprint Technologies, Europlacer, and Blakell Europlacer Distribution business units. All three are active and pre-eminent in the electronic circuit board assembly sector with advanced product and service solutions for electronics manufacturers in the UK and globally. Speedprint Technologies is a provider of screen printing equipment used in surface mount assembly processes. Europlacer is a provider of surface mount component placement equipment. Blakell Europlacer Distribution augments the provision of screen printing and pick & place platforms in the UK with a range of associated equipment, including AOI, reflow and PCB handling.
