Urs Gantner

CEO

CEO interview

Urs, can you share some of VAT's key achievements and milestones in 2024??

achievements and milestones in 2024?? I would characterize 2024 as a year of steady progress. In the semiconductor market, we recovered from the 2023 downturn and showed continuous, gradual growth from quarter to quarter. We achieved an EBITDA margin only slightly below our target range while continuing to expand our footprint and capacity for our clients by completing extensive capex projects, notably Plant 1B in Malaysia and the Innovation Center in Switzerland. Leading-edge technology and innovation are what our customers expect from us, so we haven’t stopped. Instead, we’ve accelerated our innovation efforts. We scored a record number of specification wins, with 132 in 2024. This isn’t just proof of past performance, but an important message going forward: our customers see VAT as an integral part of their product roadmap. Thanks to our high market share and technology leadership, we make our customers confident that they will succeed in the years to come.

Last but not least, we invested in our employees and strengthened our leadership teams globally. I’m always excited to meet our people all over the world and experience their passion.

 

What are the main components of VAT's new strategic direction for 2025 to 2029?

Since I took over as CEO last year, a lot of people have asked me if I'll be changing the strategy that VAT announced back in 2022. This would be surprising, since I was responsible for the semiconductor business after the IPO in 2016. However, strategy is never carved in stone. It needs adjustments based on the business and political environments. So, the strategy we've been discussing for 2025 to 2029 is not fundamentally different, but it has evolved. We've decided to focus on two main areas: our core markets, and expanding them with the addition of new products and solutions allowing us to leverage our core technology and expertise.

Our focus on vacuum valves remains a key pillar of our growth strategy. However, we also see continued growth in adjacencies. The success we have had with our motion components and advanced modules proves our ability to expand outside the traditional valves business and gain additional share of wallet. The addition of the first ALD valve to our adjacency portfolio is another milestone in this area.

Above all, our strategy centers on technology. Technology is at the core of all our product designs and the manufacture of our products, allowing us to defend our position in the markets we already operate in as well as to expand our portfolio to offer new solutions and products to our customers. We are still committed to a high innovation spend for the coming years. Our new Innovation Center will be a game-changer in terms of ensuring that we have the technology to back our ambitious growth targets.

 

You emphasize a passionate learning culture at VAT. How does the company help employees grow continuously and develop their skills?

At VAT, learning never stops. Empowered and educated employees are one of the key pillars of our corporate strategy. What does this mean in concrete terms? We expect our employees to get to know our products well and experience them, and provide different forums that they can get involved in – all centralized in our newly launched VAT Learning Academy.

We've also continued to work internally with the passions that we announced back in 2023: Integrity, Teamwork, Customer Centricity, and Innovation. In retrospect, it felt very easy to launch these passions because it was a simple but accurate description of how we have worked at VAT for many years. Reflecting on our 60th anniversary, which we'll be celebrating in 2025, we see that the entrepreneurial spirit of our founder lives on today among everyone who works at VAT.

We have also stepped up our efforts to support and develop talent with our CultiVATe program, a crucial element of the overall leadership development program. Leadership at VAT is less about rules, policies, and hierarchies, and more about behavior, role modeling, teamwork, and an entrepreneurial winning spirit.

We are not exporting a Swiss culture to our international locations. We are creating a global VAT culture that learns from all our major locations.

Nurturing younger talent is also a priority. In Switzerland we have a very successful apprenticeship program. On average, we employ 40 apprentices in Haag. In 2024, 11 apprentices successfully completed their program, and most will continue to work at VAT. This unique education, which imparts a combination of practical skills in areas such as machining and purity as well as theoretical knowledge, creates a pipeline for our machining and engineering jobs. This is such an important part of our competitiveness that we have exported this structure to our plant in Malaysia, where we established an apprenticeship program this year.

VAT products are also among the best recruitment tools we have at universities – since we sell to academic researchers, some of our core engineering talent is already familiar with our products before even considering working here. Late in 2024, for example, we announced a collaboration with the ETH feasibility lab, and we maintain good relations with local universities in the Rhine Valley. We hire interns for various teams, allowing graduates to find out whether life at VAT would be something for them.

 

How does VAT balance its Swiss heritage with its global presence and diverse cultures?

It's important to realize that our culture has been a blend of Swiss and international from the very outset. Our founder, Siegried Schertler, was an Austrian from the Vorarlberg who initially worked in Balzers in the Principality of Liechtenstein. He founded VAT in Flawil, Switzerland, in 1965 before moving to Haag a year later. When he started VAT, he wasn't thinking about nationalities or borders. He was focused on opportunities. He knew that the main opportunity at the time lay in extreme ultra-high vacuum applications such as physics research. It was his decision in the late 1980s to start working with semiconductor customers that resulted in the unique position we find ourselves in today.

We have always had an embracing, inclusive international culture that expands in line with our presence in the markets. Today, we have over 50 nationalities at our site in Haag alone. We are not exporting a Swiss culture to our international locations. We are creating a global VAT culture that learns from all our major locations. The international nature of our customer base is reflected in the fact that only a small percentage of our sales are generated in Switzerland.

 

VAT is committed to fulfilling its environmental, social, and governance (ESG) responsibilities. Can you highlight some of the key ESG initiatives the company has undertaken?

VAT's commitment to further enhancing its structure has involved investing both in people and in training on sustainability matters. We have a dedicated team concentrating full time on the topic of sustainability in addition to the functional experts in procurement, operations, human resources, and legal.

Having followed the principles of the Responsible Business Alliance (RBA) for many years, in 2024 we officially became an affiliate member. This underscores our commitment to integrating the highest standards of ESG practice in our global operations. It also underscores our goal of excellence in sustainability, excellence in vacuum solutions, and our dedication to transforming the way our industry works.

We're striving to reduce our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by sourcing renewable energy and improving the carbon footprint of our products. In 2024, VAT committed to the GHG reduction initiatives as set out by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are other key dimensions of sustainability at VAT. DEI is crucial to VAT's efforts to attract and retain talent and promote an inclusive work environment that boosts employee well-being and efficiency. We strive to train employees across the company to reinforce awareness of the importance of inclusion and the risks of harassment in the workplace.

Diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) are other key dimensions of sustainability at VAT. DEI is crucial to VAT’s efforts to attract and retain talent and promote an inclusive work environment that boosts employee well-being and efficiency. We strive to train employees across the company to reinforce awareness of the importance of inclusion and the risks of harassment in the workplace.

 

VAT recently underwent a brand refresh. Can you explain the reasons behind this and what it represents for the company?

After six decades, we felt it was time to update our brand with a fresh and cohesive appearance that accurately reflects our innovative culture and core values. Our new brand promise, “Empowering your tomorrow,” highlights the standards we adhere to and our role in contributing to various global megatrends.

A strong brand is essential for attracting and retaining top talent, as it reflects the company's values, culture, and reputation, making it an appealing place to work. It also fosters a sense of pride and alignment among current employees, enhancing engagement and loyalty while positioning the organization as a desirable employer for future candidates.

 

Can you share your vision for VAT's future and the key areas of focus for the next few years?

We will continue to execute our strategy with a focus on the expected growth of the semiconductor market. That means that we will gradually fill our available capacity at the two plants in Malaysia over the next two to three years, bringing in additional equipment for the machining hall and installing additional cleanrooms for assembly. At the same time, we will further leverage our new plant in Romania, which serves as an internal supplier, and keep modernizing the facilities in Switzerland. We are committed to Switzerland as a place to do business, and we are expanding regionally to be closer to our customers.

We will also continue working closely with our customers to deliver the latest technology and solutions for their semiconductor manufacturing tools. With 2 nm node technology expected to be installed from 2025 onwards, the pace is set for the introduction of 1.6 nm from 2027/28 onward.

Our end markets are exposed to the semiconductor investment cycle and chips are one of the areas of contest in geopolitics. But VAT is not dependent on any single country, company or technology. In semiconductors, VAT is agnostic when it comes to all these developments. As long as a chip is manufactured for any new technology, we will be part of it.

We are excited about the technologies of which we will be a part in the ADV business. Fusion reactors were once the realm of science fiction. We're helping them become science fact. Quantum computing will be the next step in semiconductors, and we are already working closely with the companies that are pushing the boundaries in this space.

In addition, there are over 1.7 million VAT valves installed globally – and that number is growing. Our engineers on the ground are assisting customers with servicing these, be it with spare parts, consumables, repairs, and even upgrades. This is also an important element of our sustainability strategy: our ability to install replacement valves with higher efficiency.

Our brand promise is to “empower your tomorrow.” So, first and foremost, we're working with our customers to define this tomorrow.