Over the last couple of years, delays created by the pandemic have snowballed into severe supply chain disruptions. While many manufacturers decided to ramp down production in early 2020, demand for a huge number of consumer products skyrocketed as a large fraction of the population found itself spending much more time at home.
This huge surge in demand pushed intricate global supply chains to their limits, and the compounding effects of this left virtually no industry unscathed.1 The world’s supplies of everything from potatoes to semiconductors dwindled, faltered, and, in some cases, stopped entirely.2,3
Most of the world is still feeling the effects of this disruption, and leading economists foretell several more years of snarled-up supply chains.4,5 However, there is one type of business that will weather the storm better than others: those, like Mid-Mountain Materials, Inc. that make use of vertical integration.
The Advantages of Vertical Integration
Vertical integration is where a company owns and controls multiple stages in its supply chain. For example, an average bakery purchases flour from a miller, which in turn buys grain from a farmer. This leaves the bakery vulnerable to unpredictable variations in supply that lie outside their control: if the price of flour increases, their material costs increase, and if a shipment of flour is delayed, they may be unable to operate at all.
A vertically integrated bakery, on the other hand, would keep things “in-house”. Such a bakery might mill its own flour, or even grow its own grain to be milled. In this way, a vertically integrated company protects itself from supply chain issues and secures independence from external suppliers.
Vertical integration of the supply chain brings many advantages. First, it enables companies to adapt more quickly to fluctuations in supply and demand. Increased availability of information from different parts of the supply chain gives greater predictability and synchronization of supply and demand, enabling the entire supply chain to operate efficiently as a whole.
Second, vertical integration lowers costs. Mark-up of intermediate components is eliminated, which means transaction costs are minimized and finished products can be produced at a substantially lower cost.
Finally – and perhaps most importantly – vertical integration enables the creation of better and higher quality products. Quality can be tightly and reliably controlled at every stage in manufacturing by keeping as many processes in-house as possible. In addition, vertically integrated businesses can better tailor their products to customer requirements: rather than specializing in a single step of the production process, a vertically integrated business can adapt every manufacturing stage to suit customer requirements and better solve specific problems.
How We Use Vertical Integration
At Mid-Mountain, we’re big believers in vertical integration. Combining vertical integration of manufacturing processes with a strong commitment to research and development enables us to innovate freely, avoid unreliable supply chains, and deliver high-quality and cost-effective products to our customers.
Vertical integration plays an important role throughout our THERMOPAK® product range.
THERMOPAK® Crucible Lid Seal Gaskets
Our THERMOPAK® Crucible Lid Seal Gaskets are suitable for a huge range of high-temperature sealing applications. These can consist of a fiberglass core coated in silicone rubber, or rubber core wrapped in a fiberglass overbraid and then coated or left untreated. Both options provide a robust, heat-resistant and airtight seal with compression properties engineered specifically for the application. A silicone coating imparts additional resistance to abrasion, extending the life of the seal.
Vertical integration of the manufacturing process enables us to produce seal gaskets in a range of shapes, sizes and material combinations to suit any customer requirements. Because we produce all of the components ourselves, Mid-Mountain Materials, Inc. can tailor the properties of our crucible lid seal gaskets to suit a range of applications such as boilers, baghouses and ovens.
THERMOPAK® External Cathode Bar Seals
Most aluminum smelting is carried out via the Hall-Héroult process, an energy-intensive procedure that involves melting aluminum oxide in a high-temperature electrochemical cell. Cathodes are inserted through the wall of the cell in order to provide an electric current. Our cathode bar seal boots provide a hermetic seal between the cathode bars and the wall of the cell.
Mid-Mountain produces all of the components of these seals, including the base fabric, the coating, cement, cord, and filler. Vertical integration means we can specify the quality and characteristics of each element, resulting in a high-performance seal that can last for the entire service life of a smelter pot.
THERMOPAK® Fabricated Tadpole Tape
Tadpole tapes consist of a bulb and a tail section: when the bulb is compressed it forms an insulating seal, while the tail fixes the tape in place. We produce our THERMOPAK® Tadpole Tapes by combining a cover material with an inner core (the bulb) in a stitched configuration. Because we manufacture a range of core, cover and coating materials, we’re able to provide tadpole tapes in a huge array of configurations to suit our customers’ exacting requirements.
THERMOPAK® Robot Covers
Our robot covers are built to protect industrial robots from high temperatures, corrosion and abrasion in a multitude of industrial environments. Each robot cover is made from our proprietary ARMATEX® SBN 13-692 ROBOTEX, a unique high-strength silicone-coated fabric, which we then stitch into shape to produce covers to suit specific robots. Thanks to vertical integration of these processes, we can offer robot covers with short lead times and at competitive prices.
Vertical integration is central to what we do: it enables us to produce innovative, high-quality products tailored to our customers’ needs. To find out more about the range of thermal insulation barriers and environmental protection products from Mid-Mountain Materials, Inc., get in touch with a member of our team today.
References and Further Reading
1. What Happened to Supply Chains in 2021? Council on Foreign Relations https://www.cfr.org/article/what-happened-supply-chains-2021.
2. A growing global potato shortage is affecting french fries, from Japan to Kenya. Washington Post.
3. Sparkes, M. There’s a global shortage of computer chips – what’s causing it? New Scientist https://www.newscientist.com/article/2271918-theres-a-global-shortage-of-computer-chips-whats-causing-it/.
4. Goodman, P. S. How the Supply Chain Broke, and Why It Won’t Be Fixed Anytime Soon. The New York Times (2021).
5. Farrer, M. Global supply chain crisis could last another two years, warn experts. The Guardian (2021).
