ROCKINGHAM — In a dramatic restructuring that will allow employee-owned Chroma Technology Corp. to take advantage of rapidly expanding international markets, the company announced on July 16 that former IBM-GlobalFoundries leader Janette Bombardier has accepted the newly created position of Chief Engineering Officer.
Bombardier is a dynamic leader and manufacturing expert and licensed professional engineer. According to a news release, she said she is looking forward to helping to drive Chroma's worldwide growth while leading the company's engineering and technical functions.
At IBM/GlobalFoundries, Bombardier was not only the company's senior site location executive; she also had a wide breadth of technical, management, leadership and continuous improvement positions. She comes to Chroma from Green Mountain Power, where she was a Senior Vice President leading commercial and industrial relations as well as cost performance initiatives
“Chroma Technology is a great company and I am excited to be part of the executive leadership team,” Bombardier said in prepared statement. “I'm also happy to be back in a technically challenging technology development and manufacturing company, one that has a true focus on customer success. The commitment of the organization to its employee-owners and its support of the community are values that I respect and are important to me.”
Chroma CEO Paul Millman said his company, which is feeling the tug of growth potential in a new technological age, is thrilled to have Bombardier join its executive team.
“Over the years, we at Chroma have basically made up how we produce things as we go along,” Millman said in a prepared statement. “We've made up the steps. Now the world of optical filters is changing dramatically.
“Everything that is new in the world involves light. Agricultural drones, autonomous vehicles, cell phone displays, point-of-care medical test systems, robots - it all involves light and color.
“These industries, vehicles, cell phones and the people using them want millions of filters. Not hundreds or even thousands, but millions. Janette Bombardier's expertise presents us with an opportunity to get more efficient and better at what we do and grow even more.”
Millman said Bombardier will change the way Chroma does things.
“Production needs to be done in logical steps without bottlenecks,” he said. “The process has to flow smoothly to deliver the product to our customers. To have someone with Janette's kind of experience rationalize the production is a great opportunity. We need to get better at what we do because we have much more business than we had.”
Chroma, founded in Brattleboro 27 years ago, reported 2017 revenues of $31.6 million. It currently employs 136 people. The company manufactures optical filters for the scientific, biomedical, photonics and imaging and detection industries.
The filters and mirrors that Chroma manufactures are used in microscopes, DNA sequencers and clinical diagnostic devices, among other applications. The company has a worldwide customer base with established offices in Europe and Asia.
The company recently opened up a new 28,000-square-foot clean manufacturing addition to its Rockingham plant. Chroma also owns and manages a subsidiary, 89 North, soon to move to Williston, which specializes in innovative products for biomedical imaging.