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President and CEO, Therm, Inc.  Bob Sprole never intended to take over the family machining business, but he readily took the reins more than a decade ago when the time came for a change of leadership.
After practicing law in both Tampa and Syracuse, Sprole decided to extend a temporary position with the company started by his grandfather and stay at Therm long-term. "I expected I'd go into business management, just not in the family business," Sprole said. In the Family Sprole's grandfather and an engineering professor at nearby Cornell University started the Ithaca, N.Y.-based company in 1935 making utility meters. The company, which started in the basement of an engineering building at Cornell, moved to its current site in 1937. Materials to make meters became scarce during World War II and the company began producing supplies, including radar parts and gun barrels, for the war. After the war, the company began its tool and die work. In 1948, Therm built forging dies for Thompson Products for Pratt & Whitney's first jet engine. By the 1950s, the company took its current name and was busy making parts for companies like IBM, Kodak and Corning. "By the late 1950s, we realized there was more repeat business if you machined the parts instead of just making the dies," Sprole said. "That's when the company really took off and developed that niche." By 1970, 90 percent of the company's activities were focused on turbine parts. The company, now with more than 180 employees and a 150,000-square-foot facility, produces a full range of machined parts.
A New Era After Sprole took over as president and CEO of Therm in 1995, he observed a decade of industry consolidation largely from the sidelines. "Remaining independent gives us a lot of flexibility. A lot of our competitors were taken over by their customers, but we're able to follow the market," Sprole said. "The companies that survived that period of consolidation learned to adapt to new requirements, and we're producing better and more consistent products than at any time in history. "Ten years ago, we were maybe one of 20 suppliers for a customer. Now, we're often one of four or five." Several aspects of the industry have grown up over the past 10 to 20 years, Sprole said. Quality requirements, for example, have created a demand for higher quality parts and more responsibility has shifted to the supply chain. "Having standards that get everyone on the same page has dramatically changed the way people do business, the way we interact with each other and with our customers," Sprole said. In addition to cementing his company's relationships with existing customers, Sprole is also reaching out to the global marketplace. Today, Therm's third largest customer is a foreign company. And, like many suppliers, Sprole is very much focused on the policy issues that impact that global supply chain. "As commercial business expands, export controls for U.S.-based manufacturers are more and more important," Sprole said. "A balance needs to be maintained between getting us access to foreign markets and allowing companies with unfair advantages to have access to our markets. "On a level playing field, our companies are very well equipped to compete globally. We certainly deserve the chance to compete." Evolution of the Suppliers' Role Those types of policy concerns are partly what prompted Sprole to join AIA's Supplier Management Council. When Sprole joined the SMC a few years ago, the council only had about 25 member companies. Today, that number stands at more than 170. In addition to the escalating numbers, the organization has fundamentally evolved over that time. "At the beginning, the SMC was very much about member companies speaking and suppliers listening," Sprole said. "Today, there's more of a dialogue. There's a legitimate back and forth, with suppliers involved in presentations at meetings and such." Sprole has also witnessed a change in the political footprint of supplier companies, especially after the SMC advocated against a contentious specialty metals provision on Capitol Hill in 2006. Through the SMC, he said, suppliers began to discover their voice in the political process. For the future, particularly as the group continues to grow, Sprole sees the SMC moving toward a semi-autonomous entity tied to the larger AIA organization but with a scope of activities and opportunities for associate members. The council will also maintain its educating and enlightening function, however. "For smaller companies, you don't get a chance anywhere else to hear firsthand about the industry like you do through the SMC," he said. "Without the SMC, you're left looking at the Wall Street Journal or Aviation Week for aerospace news."
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