Heat Treat Radio #136: Steelhead Acquires Visual Shop and Bluestreak — What Heat Treaters Need to Know

Yeah.

And thanks for having me, Doug, and, and appreciate the, uh, the differentiation between captive and commercial heat treaters.

Um, the commercial heat treaters, like I, I was just in one literally yesterday, and all the photos of all the product that are on the wall, on the wall, it, it's just, like, anything that flies, goes into space, uh, data centers, computers, and, and that's...

I, I, so I think that commercial heat treaters find themselves in one of the most important seats in manufacturing because of the pace of iteration.

If you think about it, like if you're doing like brake rotors and it's the same brake rotor for 40 years, you're gonna bring that in-house.

It makes sense to, to buy the oven.

But if you're changing your designs every six months, like is happening in space and, and data centers, et cetera, uh, then commercial is, is the clear, uh, path.

So, um, but anyways, uh, an intro for myself.

My name is Jeff Hallinan.

I'm a mechanical engineer.

I, uh, my, my career started at, at General Motors.

Um, got into some heat treating, but it was, uh, super mild compared to what everyone gets into as in body structures, and there's, uh, a lot of, lot of thermal, uh, management components to assembling a, a vehicle.

Uh, but anyways, I'm one of the co-founders of, of Steelhead, and, uh, we are a technology partner for, for job shops.

So, uh, uh, we serve, uh, uh, commercial heat treaters, but also, uh, metal finishers, platers, powder coaters, uh, Nadcap, wet paint, thermal spray, and also some fabrication, uh, as well.

But generally our customers have, um, as low as three people, but typically it's 20 people to 300 people, somewhere in that range, where they're big enough to have a lot of problems, uh, and then they're, they're a job shop, right? So parts are coming in, phone calls, uh, just high, high volume, go, go, go, go, go.

These aren't $10,000 invoices, $20,000 invoices.

They're, they're smaller, right? They're a few hundred bucks, a few thousand dollars, and there's high volumes of them.

And, uh, everyone's, everyone's dealing with the, the problems of labor turnover and, and, and challenges with, with, um...

It's a, it's a very, uh, nerve-wracking business.

Uh, the revenue volatility for one is, is, is, is, is kind of extreme-

Yeah

... a lot of times, and your visibility and your control over that revenue volatility is, um, not high, and there's ways you can diversify.

But, uh, so anyways, we, we have a, a core philosophy that, you know, job shops are, are actually ideally suited to leverage technology to the hilt-

Right

... uh, to compensate for all of this.

Yeah.

And thanks for having me, Doug, and, and appreciate the, uh, the differentiation between captive and commercial heat treaters.

Um, the commercial heat treaters, like I, I was just in one literally yesterday, and all the photos of all the product that are on the wall, on the wall, it, it's just, like, anything that flies, goes into space, uh, data centers, computers, and, and that's...

I, I, so I think that commercial heat treaters find themselves in one of the most important seats in manufacturing because of the pace of iteration.

If you think about it, like if you're doing like brake rotors and it's the same brake rotor for 40 years, you're gonna bring that in-house.

It makes sense to, to buy the oven.

But if you're changing your designs every six months, like is happening in space and, and data centers, et cetera, uh, then commercial is, is the clear, uh, path.

So, um, but anyways, uh, an intro for myself.

My name is Jeff Hallinan.

I'm a mechanical engineer.

I, uh, my, my career started at, at General Motors.

Um, got into some heat treating, but it was, uh, super mild compared to what everyone gets into as in body structures, and there's, uh, a lot of, lot of thermal, uh, management components to assembling a, a vehicle.

Uh, but anyways, I'm one of the co-founders of, of Steelhead, and, uh, we are a technology partner for, for job shops.

So, uh, uh, we serve, uh, uh, commercial heat treaters, but also, uh, metal finishers, platers, powder coaters, uh, Nadcap, wet paint, thermal spray, and also some fabrication, uh, as well.

But generally our customers have, um, as low as three people, but typically it's 20 people to 300 people, somewhere in that range, where they're big enough to have a lot of problems, uh, and then they're, they're a job shop, right? So parts are coming in, phone calls, uh, just high, high volume, go, go, go, go, go.

These aren't $10,000 invoices, $20,000 invoices.

They're, they're smaller, right? They're a few hundred bucks, a few thousand dollars, and there's high volumes of them.

And, uh, everyone's, everyone's dealing with the, the problems of labor turnover and, and, and challenges with, with, um...

It's a, it's a very, uh, nerve-wracking business.

Uh, the revenue volatility for one is, is, is, is, is kind of extreme-

Yeah

... a lot of times, and your visibility and your control over that revenue volatility is, um, not high, and there's ways you can diversify.

But, uh, so anyways, we, we have a, a core philosophy that, you know, job shops are, are actually ideally suited to leverage technology to the hilt-

Right

... uh, to compensate for all of this.