Altek: Another world, and a fast-growing one

Visit Altek Inc., of Spokane, and you enter another world.

The growing Spokane company is serving some of the most high-tech industries anywhere by being extremely high-tech itself.

The custom manufacturer employs rows of computer-controlled machining devices and plastic injection-molding presses to produce metal and plastic parts for customers far and wide.

"We've got the whole place on computers," says Vice President Mark Becktell.

On one recent day, some of the Spokane company's machining equipment was hollowing out and precision-drilling parts for machines that remove plaque from blood-vessel walls. When those cylindrical plastic parts are in use, they will turn at 200,000 revolutions a minute.

A manufacturer has little margin for error when producing such items. The specs call for the parts to have no detectable burrs when viewed under a 20-power microscope. To make sure the parts meet specs, Altek workers deburr them under high magnification.

"We're a tight-tolerance, high-end, custom manufacturer," says Bob O'Briant, the company's molding production manager.

Altek is that, and more.

It's one of Spokane's faster growing--and more interesting--companies, It now employs 120 people full time at its modern Meadow Wood plant--30 more workers than just two years ago.

In the company's machining room, machines crank out metal and plastic parts--changing their own bits when necessary.

In the plastic injection room, other machines shoot hot plastics into molds under high pressure to make other plastic parts.

What really impresses you about Altek's plant, however, is the cleanliness. The machining room's tile floor is waxed twice a week. You could eat off of it, and other are of the plant are neat and tidy.

Sales manager Tim Boden says the manic cleanliness tell workers that things must be done right in...