Xten Industries LLC is so named because the company aims to be an extension of its customers’ businesses.
Xten Industries LLC
Industry: Contract manufacturing
Address: 9600 55th St. in Kenosha
Employees: 95
Annual revenues: $20 million
As a contract manufacturing company with plastic injection molding capabilities, Xten focuses on centralizing the materials and processes used to assemble a product to eliminate supply chain frustrations for its clients.
In addition to molding the plastic for a product, Xten employees install and assemble other parts, apply labels, box and ship the finished product.
“We do the things they’re not able to do anymore or just don’t want to do,” said Matthew Davidson, co-founder and chief executive officer. “Our customers can come to us and ask us to do virtually anything, and as long as they’re willing to pay a fair price for it, we’re willing to do it.”
Xten will receive the Kenosha County Business of the Year Award at the Kenosha County Business Excellence Awards presented by the Kenosha Area Business Alliance (KABA) and the Kenosha Area Chamber of Commerce on Nov. 3.
From a restaurant’s napkin holders to a hospital’s medical waste containers, Xten assembles a wide range of plastic-based products at its 78,000-square-foot facility.
The 95-employee company, located at 9600 55th St. in Kenosha, expects about $20 million in revenue this year. Xten has experienced an average 21 percent revenue increase for each of the last three years, said William Renick, co-founder and president.
“We’ve hooked our wagons to the right customers, who are growing,” and the company has added several new customers this year, Renick said. “We’ve got more in the hopper than we’ve ever had in our business.”
Xten has room to accommodate that growth, with an adjacent lot that would allow the company to double the size of its building. Since they don’t plan to expand the physical size of the facility yet, the company has been offering the space to high school students who started a community garden.
The company has also been creating efficiencies through energy saving investments of about $200,000. A Wisconsin Focus on Energy grant helped Xten install variable speed motors and heat-conserving bands on its machines, as well as motion-activated lighting last year, which have resulted in a 30 percent reduction in energy costs this year, Davidson said.
Davidson, Renick and a third partner purchased the company, then called Hauser Plas Tech and based in Chicago, in 2000.
The logistics involved with offering customers more than just plastic parts meant the company needed additional space for engineering, materials, assembly, warehouse and drop shipping, Davidson said. After acquiring Kenosha-based Priority Tool and Manufacturing in 2001, Xten changed to its current name and consolidated operations in Kenosha in 2002.
Xten’s largest customers are in the medical, hazardous, radioactive and corrosive waste industries, as well as paper product dispenser manufacturers, commercial laundry systems and ice machine makers. The company focuses on clients that have revenues between $50 million and $5 billion and do not require high volume production.
That way, Xten can focus on making and assembling a custom product for each company and training its employees on each new process.
“Our ability to help our customers really plays better to smaller companies,” Renick said.
Xten production is on a 24-hour cycle, with three shifts working five days per week.
In addition to being named the Kenosha County Business of the Year, Xten has been a Metropolitan Milwaukee Association of Commerce Future 50 winner for the last three years and was honored by the Wisconsin Department of Commerce as a Wisconsin Company to Watch this year.
