September 13, 2018
Canadian Business and Maclean’s released its list of Canadian companies that showed significant growth this year, and Angstrom Engineering was on it for the 6th year in a row. According to the owners, Andrew Campbell and Dave Pitts, this is due to the continued success of our customers, who are referred to and treated as partners.
Ranking Canada’s Fastest-Growing Companies by five-year revenue growth, the Growth 500—formerly known as the PROFIT 500—profiles the country’s most successful entrepreneurial businesses. Given the growth of the industry as a whole, as well as Angstrom’s unique position as a trusted partner for scientists all over the world, the news is unsurprising, though welcome. Angstrom Engineering focuses on doing everything possible for its partners. “Our success is tied very closely with our partner’s success. When they do well, we do well, so it makes sense to do absolutely everything we can to make sure they do well,” says co-owner Andrew Campbell.
When employees of the company attempt to describe to friends and family what we do, it can be difficult. What is a thin film deposition system, after all? Thin film deposition covers a very broad spectrum of applications and products, including optical coatings, electronics, display technologies, physical coatings (on things like sports equipment, artificial limbs, and drill bits), fundamental scientific research, microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), medical coatings (like antibacterial silver coatings), medical implants, next-generation solid-state batteries, and a lot more.
Thin film is employed in so many technologies that we all use every single day that it takes considerable effort not to take it for granted. It’s also used extensively in developing novel technologies by some of the world’s most brilliant scientific minds, innovating ideas so far only conceived in science fiction, like octopus inspired camouflage clothing, edible electronics, smart-clothes, and even robots with the sense of touch.
Three areas of significant growth for Angstrom over the past 5 years are OLED, perovskite solar energy generation, and quantum computing. Angstrom Engineering was part of pioneering days of OLED in the 1990’s, when we supplied the means to develop the technology to researchers at Princeton University and University of Michigan. 2013 to present represent the pioneering days of solar’s wundermaterial perovskite, which many believe to be the cheaper, less energy intensive successor to silicon. Angstrom Engineering provides many of the world’s leading perovskite researchers with the tools they need to bring about this potential solar revolution. Finally, investment is ever-increasing in the realm of quantum computing. What was once a technology assigned to theoretical prototypes is now going mainstream. Once again, Angstrom Engineering finds itself providing tools to quantum computing’s pioneers who are fabricating quantum bits (qubits) via thin film fabricated Josephson junctions.
Angstrom Engineering’s DNA consists of a mandate to partner with its customers, to provide them the best possible product, followed up by tangible human support. When this recipe is combined with agile leadership, a quietly competent workforce, and most importantly, partnerships with brilliant innovators and industrialists from all over the world, then growth is sure to follow.
About the Growth 500
For 30 years, the Growth 500 ranking of Canada’s Fastest-Growing Companies has been Canada’s most respected and influential ranking of entrepreneurial achievement. Developed by PROFIT and now published in a special Growth 500 print issue of Canadian Business (packaged with the October issue of Maclean’s magazine) and online at Growth500.ca and CanadianBusiness.com, the Growth 500 ranks Canadian companies on five-year revenue growth. For more information on the ranking, visit Growth500.ca.