Shang Chuen Adds More Cleverly-designed Electronic Scales to Its Line
2010/10/11 | By Ken Liu | SHANG CHUEN WEIGHTING MACHINE CO., LTD.Model SDB-HA100 is reportedly the smallest of its kind
SDA family of scales is about the size of a BlackBerry smartphone. Equipped with an LCD touch screen, the scale shows mass and optional weight units as gram, ounce, troy ounces (ozt) and carat by pressing an icon. SDA handles a maximum weight of 200 grams with accuracy of 0.01 gram and 500 grams with accuracy of 0.1 gram. Also energy-saving, it has a screen that automatically shuts off after a short period of idle operation, while its cover doubles as a weighing tray. This scale is built with counting capability.
The lighter SDB-HA100, measuring 40mm x 72mm x 12mm, is reportedly the industry's smallest scale, with a maximum capacity of 100 grams and accuracy of 0.01 gram.
Models USB-1 and SBF-9001 are the two bathroom scales equipped with USB interface, enabling users to upload physical data to computer supported by dedicated software for analysis. USB-1 measures body mass index (BMI) and weight, so is suitable as a household scale. More specialized, SBF-9001 is suitable for professional and amateur athletes for being able to measure fat, muscle mass, visceral fat, water content, bone mass, and calories in addition to BMI and weight.
USB-1 handles maximum 250 kilograms or 551 pounds, while SBF-9001's maximum capacity is 180 kilograms or 396 pounds. Powered by four AAA batteries, USB-1 displays results on a 98mm x 56mm LCD screen, with SBF-9001 running on six AA batteries.
The FBS-series scales are another range of cleverly designed products. These portable scales, with a controller and notebook-sized weighing platform, are ideal for charging and recovery of refrigerants. Depending on model, the scales handle 30 kilograms to 150 kilograms. Improved from the heavy iron weighing platform, this scale has an attractive rugged aluminum cast body. “We command 70% of the world market for portable scales for adopting such considerate design,” claims the company chairman, W.H. Lee, who served as chairman of the Taichung Weight Scale Association between 1998 and early 2004.
The company's SA-B2000 high-precision weighing scale, powered by adopter, handles maximum capacity up to 2,000 grams with accuracy of 0.01 gram. It shows optional weight units as gram, carat, pound, ounce and troy ounce. Counting capability is also designed into this scale. Counting results show up on an LCD screen lighted up by a blue backlight. A dual side LCD display is optional.
The maker's success is attributable to its diligent research and development, which Lee says costs around 6% of corporate revenue a year.
In addition to employing 20 R&D specialists, the company also works with Ling Tung University near the company's Taichung headquarters and the government-backed Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) on new product development.
Usually, the company spends on average 60 days to develop a new product with off-the-shelf software.
Investing in R&D pays off as evidenced by having acquired over 40 patents on some 100 products, which are exported to global clients, but mainly in Europe, the United States, the Middle East, Latin America, Japan, South Korea and Russia. Also, the maker's price-computing scales comply with standards set by the Paris-headquartered International Organization of Legal Metrology (OIML).
Doing business with a Japanese client has resulted in fringe but influential benefit. Shang Chuen was contracted to supply Shimadzu Corp. of Japan electronic scales in 1994. “The Japanese company helped us improve manufacturing techniques, especially our load-cell technology, and also asked us to set up a computerized temperature/humidity testing chamber,” Lee recalls.
Supplying the Japanese client has turned Shang Chuen into an electronic-scale maker capable of producing load cells, the weight sensor in precision electronic scales.
Precision calibration is designed into the company's scales, allowing users worldwide to take into account of different gravity.
According to Lee, the company sells 60% of its products under its “SATRUE” brand, whose derivation may be based on the Taiwanese for “highest precision,” or Taiwanese pronunciation of “SO TRUE”, or even the Japanese pronunciation of the same and adopted by the maker, and the remaining 40% as OEM orders.
Working out of its factories in Dongguan, China, the maker has total manpower of 1,000.
Shortly after shipping products to Eastern Europe, the company in 1990 set up a factory in Xiamen, a city on the southern coast of China across from Taiwan, to tap the local market. Lee tried to sell the electronic scales sold in Taiwan to grocery stores and street vendors, but had to refocus on exporting, “because the vendors there feared the precision of my scales would spoil their fraudulent practice.” Lee has sworn to make precision scales ever since being wrongly accused of theft while a draftee, an incident attributable to shady merchants' using doctored scales to defraud customers.
The Dongguang factory was established seven years later and expanded in 2006.
Mainland Chinese competitors are complicating business by underselling worldwide. “We still price our products around 30% above theirs regardless of their underselling for our products and reputation are much more reliable,” Lee stresses. The company's products are guaranteed for two years.
Lee is considering moving its export-oriented Dongguang factory back to Taiwan in consideration of hiked production cost in the mainland. (Aug. 2010)
