Keysight opens new calibration labs in Victoria

Test and measurement company Keysight Technologies has opened a new site in Mulgrave, Victoria, offering what it describes as a true one-stop shop for calibration needs.

The site opening follows the company’s acquisition of Thales Calibrations Services in late 2018, and sees a merger of Keysight’s own labs with those of Thales in a brand new building that houses administration, sales and marketing as well as the labs, repairs and logistics — custom built to accommodate the very precise requirements of the company’s test, measurement and calibration procedures. The combined site will mean that customers can have all their instruments calibrated by the one supplier, in a process that should improve accuracy, reduce logistical complexity and shorten turnaround time.

Speaking to What’s New in Electronics magazine, John Page, Keysight’s Senior Vice President and President of Global Services, explained, “Thales had their own internal labs, and they had a lot of capabilities, especially around physical and dimensional calibrations, that we didn’t have — at least not in Australia. And in order to really do that one-stop shop for our customers, we needed to have that capability as well. And so we took two different labs — we were sharing space with Agilent just down the road, and we had the Thales lab, and we put them together.

“We’ve done the same thing in some other areas in the world — we’ve done it in the US, we’ve done it in the UK, where we’ve bought other labs that have physical dimensional type of capabilities, we bring it together with our electronic capabilities, and create that one-stop shop. So this is a continuation and extension of the strategy that we’ve had, in a market that’s very important for us. We’re really excited about having this lab here in Australia and of its capability.”

Sang Ho Oh, South Asia Pacific Marketing Manager; Lawrence Liu, South Asia Pacific Sales General Manager; Keith Baucke, Australia/NZ Service Solutions Business Manager; John Page, Keysight Global Services President; Steve Karandais, Australia/NZ General Manager; Bor-Chun Gooi, Managed Services Division East General Manager; and Kuan Gin Voon, South & East Asia Workplace Solutions Director.

Keysight Australia now performs more than 16,000 calibrations a year for a growing list of Keysight and non-Keysight electrical, physical, dimensional and optical instruments, leveraging the capability made possible by the Thales acquisition. This includes a comprehensive electrical scope of accreditation, dimensional metrology, heat and temperature, pressure, trade measurement, on-site calibration and related support and services for industries including government and defence, commercial, medical, petrochemical and pharmaceutical, all backed by more than 65 years of continuous National Association of Testing Authorities (NATA) accreditation.

“Most manufacturers just invest in their own products; Keysight’s invested in automation on a broad range of products,” said Keith Baucke, Keysight Australia Services Business Manager. “Of all our incoming work, I would say less than half is Keysight products.

“Keysight’s customers can be confident that we have the knowledge and expertise, backed by ISO 17025 accreditation, and now the combined site, to meet all of their calibration, asset management and support services needs in one place.”

“Customers in all industries are currently being challenged by new technology and devices, many of which need to be tested with high-performance instruments that need to be calibrated,” added Steve Karandais, Keysight Australia’s General Manager. “The equipment may come from different vendors and have different maintenance schedules which all need to be tracked and managed, and this is only set to increase in the future. With the businesses now combined, Keysight is looking to offer extended services for all equipment vendors to all customers to fuel growth in the region.”

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