About > About Cristek

Making seamless connections.

A Heritage of accomplishment.

Cristek Interconnects, Inc. is a genuine American success story...

Armed with little more than a fistful of credit cards, a $25,000 contract from Litton and a small loan from her first boss, 23-year-old Cristi Cristich founded Cristek in 1985 to serve the military and aerospace industries and their warfighters. Over 25 years later, Cristek boasts a diverse and experienced management team, over 100 employees and more than 56,000 square feet of manufacturing facilities in Southern California and New England.

From its inception until now, Cristek Interconnects has consistently earned the trust of its customers by combining solid interconnect design and manufacturing expertise with a "can-do" entrepreneurial spirit. As a result, they have been named Subcontractor of the Year for Region IX by the US Small Business Administration and have earned numerous industry and customer awards.

Cristek's consistent, near-perfect performance, has earned it a position as preferred supplier to several major military/aerospace prime contractors and is a testament to its ability to operate a process disciplined and metric- based business while maintaining its customer-focused, entrepreneurial roots.

Bringing unparalleled expertise to mission-critical challenges.

Cristek Interconnect's extensive range of interconnect technologies and deep commitment to process discipline provide even the most demanding customers with rapid, seamless progression through concept, proof of design, proof of manufacture and full scale production.

Cristek leverages its vertical integration and engineering expertise to distinguish itself as a best-in-class cable, harness and complex electromechanical assembly manufacturer. Cristek is one of only a handful of interconnect suppliers with expertise in DC through 67 GHz RF frequency connector, cable and electromechanical design and assembly.

Cristek's expertise in nanominiature and microminiature connector technology also makes it the company of choice for standard applications as well as custom solutions for high-density, high-reliability interconnects in both rectangular and circular configurations. Adding EMI filtering and hermetic sealing to its connectors while designing and manufacturing application-specific connectors and next-level assemblies for ultra-high-speed, matched-impedance requirements puts Cristek in a class by itself when it comes to solving mission-critical challenges.

Ensuring "Best Overall Value" through experience and innovation.

Cristek Interconnect's success would not be possible without the extraordinary creativity, quality and dedication of its people. Their contributions and effectiveness are maximized through the framework of Cristek's proprietary "Mission RADI (Reliable, Aligned ,Disciplined, Innovative)" business management systems. These systems combine a wide variety of best-in-class Lean, Six Sigma and general business tools into a fully integrated metrics-based system of operations for the company.

All product development is governed by Cristek's JANUS 9-gate system. Once JANUS determines Cristek's core competencies and corresponding resources are aligned with a given customer application, the system brings a high level of process maturity to even the most customized requirement. Each gate serves as a check and balance to keep the project reliably aligned with all customer expectations to the included on-time delivery of the product.

The speed and reliability of the JANUS system is the key enabler for Cristek's LACOTT ("Lay-A–Cable-On-The-Table") service. LACOTT means that they can often provide customers a complete prototype, with custom connectors and complex packaging, within the same timeframe it takes competitors to generate a formal proposal. Experience has proven that even with 3D modeling and other engineering technologies, nothing beats having a product in hand to engender confidence, ensure proof of design and demonstrate best overall value.

Narrowing focus to deliver superior package design solutions.

In over two decades of manufacturing, the majority of connectors produced by Cristek have been in the 32–26 AWG contact and wire range. In all, hundreds of thousands of interconnects for mission-critical and medical devices have been delivered to satisfied customers. This legacy of success and breadth of high-density packaging experience has resulted in a proven suite of standard contacts, connectors, cable and assembly products to meet nearly any environmental need and physical space constraint.

Cristek Interconnect's unique ability to package high-frequency, low-loss contact systems into the same connector system as 24 -30 AWG signal contacts sets them apart from the competition by optimizing package size and performance.