Ask the Intern: A Q&A Session with Indium Corporation’s Summer Interns
Indium Corporation Interns 2016
Indium Corporation Internship 2016: Not Your Average Internship
Indium Corporation Internship 2016: Not Your Average Internship - Commencement
Indium Corporation’s Summer Internship Program
Summer College Internship Program
Our interns add meaningful value to the projects in which they are involved. They learn outside of the textbook and apply their expertise to actual business environments.
Sure, any business can hire interns and put them to work doing menial tasks, but that’s not how Indium Corporation’s internship program works. Instead of ordering coffee and picking up the bagels, Indium Corporation’s interns complete projects and tasks as fully functioning members of the team. Here are a few examples of recent internship program projects:
Indium Corporation sends its products to multiple locations around the world daily. Some shipments can weigh up to several hundred pounds, and must withstand rigorous transportation regulations and testing in order to be shipped globally.
Procurement Intern Tricia Loso was tasked with identifying a solution to this shipping challenge as her Summer Internship program project. Tricia’s ten weeks were spent researching realistic options for a box assembly with the following goals in mind: minimize risk, lower lead time/have consistent deliveries, and accumulate a cost savings of up to 10 percent.
The project consisted of setting project targets and goals, meeting with possible suppliers, researching Department of Transportation regulations, and reviewing quotes. At the conclusion of the project, Tricia was able to identify a solution that fulfilled the rigorous shipping demands and reduced the cost of the box assembly by 41 percent per unit.
Indium Corporation uses a company-wide intranet to communicate with employees at various locations around the world. Marketing Communications Intern Brittney Liddy’s Summer College Internship Program project focused on making the company’s intranet more easily accessible and appealing to users.
Brittney started her project by reviewing information that was already on the intranet, analyzing usage data, and conducting a survey to gather feedback. The information gathered was used to drive recommendations for updates, including a new landing page design sketch.
Brittney then worked with company vendors to implement a site redesign to reduce content, thus enabling users to more efficiently navigate the site to find the information and resources that they need.
A capital project is a long-term investment that a business makes to improve its assets, such as a building or equipment. Accounting/Finance Intern Jakob Webster was tasked with the Summer College Internship Program project to recommend improvements to make Indium Corporation’s current process capital projects approval process more efficient.
Jakob’s work included searching for bottlenecks, identifying points of potential automation, and highlighting adjustments that could be added to a new training program. Through logical thinking, Jakob was able to implement knowledge attained through his SUNY Polytechnic Institute education.
Jakob’s work assisted the company in improving efficiency and ensuring proper communication between the Finance Department and other department managers.
Voiding and solder joint reliability is a critical issue in the electronics assembly industry. Research Metallurgist Intern J. J. Besse was challenged to investigate methods to increase solder joint performance and reliability for his Summer College Internship Program project.
His project included investigating how to reduce voiding and decrease the bondline thickness of solder joints in die-attach applications.
During the course of his project, J. J. worked with Research Metallurgist Dr. HongWen Zhang to perform extensive research and a number of tests in the company’s Process Simulation Lab.
“There was no ‘they’re just interns’ stigma,” J.J. summarized. “I didn’t just run and get coffee, or wait patiently for a job that was simple enough even for an intern to do. I was immediately accepted, and given the responsibilities of any full-time employee. Rarely is it possible to find somewhere to learn and develop professional skills necessary to working in the corporate setting. Indium Corporation not only gave us the chance but also facilitated and encouraged us to do so.”
