Sunday, 11 December 2011

A visit to Canon OPTO Malaysia Sdn Bhd

    On 6/12/2011, our course had a visit to the Canon OPTO Malaysia Sdn Bhd. Early in the morning, we depart to the factory from the canteen of KSJ by UTM bus.
    Once arrived there, we were shocked to see how big the factory about.






             The picture above only shows a part of the building.
    
    After we entered the building, the staffs there gave us a briefing about the history of the Canon Opto Malaysia Sdn Bhd and some safety precautions about the visit. The first camera made by kwanon (name of Canon at that time) was in 1934. In 1935, the name of kwanon was changed to Canon. In 1969, the company changed name from Canon Camera co.Inc to Canon Inc.



   In 2010, the net sales of Canon OPTO Malaysia Sdn Bhd was USD 45764 million and net income was USD 3044 million. The total employee of Canon was 197386 paxs.
   The products of the Canon were digital camera, EF lenses, video lens Unit, optical lenses (including Penta Prism). According to the staff, they will change the model of their products every year to meet the demand of the world. They also emphasize the quality of the products as the HQ of their company is very strict. Local workers and foreign workers (Sri Lanka, Indonesia and Vietnam) cooperate each other to produce the best products to the world.
   After the briefing, we had the breakfast at the canteen there.



 After having the breakfast, we entered the factory to see the running process of the whole factory. It divided into two sections to manufacture the digital camera and the lenses. Very sorry to say that we cannot take photo inside the factory. It is kind of confidential…
 When we entered it, a funny smell of chemical choked our nose very soon. At that moment, I recalled back the time I worked in the electronic factory that manufacture the circuit panels during form 4. I used to be worked in line to print the PCB by using the printers. And guess what! I also found that the factory also using the line system and printers to manufacture the products. However, as it is the branch of the Japan companies, the machines that used in it are very advanced and expansive. According to the staff, the prototypes of the lenses that produced are cheap. But after using the expensive machines to manufacture the prototype, it becomes expensive.
 At there, we managed to see about how the line processes the digital camera. Beginning from the components, it processes to become the combination of the components on the PCB and finally to the final product, a complete camera. The workers there work very serious and in a professional way. I can see how fast they work and although we are there, they seem not affected and continue to do their work like we didn’t exist. These working ethnics are worth to be learnt if we want to be successful in our career which is engineer in the future. The digital camera that we found there are in black and pink in colour. The staffs also say that they set a program in the products which need to be unlocked first before using the camera. This precaution is to avoid the workers to steal the products out of the factory although there have a few metal detectors at the entrance. They also use the theory of the reflection angle and reflective index to test and ensure that the digital camera and lenses do not have flaws and malfunction.  
 We also visit the lenses manufacturing section to see about how the lenses made. There are four processes to manufacture the lenses which are grinding, smoothing, polishing and coating. They used a brown liquid chemical and machines to undergo the first three processes. The coating process is executed in a room that contains full of the gigantic and complex machines in it. The staff explained that this process eventually increases the price of the lenses dramatically. The extremely hot temperature is used to coat the lenses by the machines. Too bad that I cannot take some photo of them…
 About the strength of the Canon, I will say that it will be certainly about their quality of the products. Look at those spirits of the worker to work and they know that the procedures to manufacture the products cannot be neglected. All of them work in a systematic way with speed and precise. About the weakness of the Canon, the products of the factory are very limited as the license to manufacture the products under the name of Canon has to be approved by Japanese company.
 After receiving the souvenir from the Canon, we finished our trip with full of satisfaction. We go back to KSJ at around 2.30pm and this will certainly become a great experience in our entire life.  

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