The Early Years

In 1972, three engineers who met through Xerox Corporation formed the company KENEDJO.  The company, whose name was derived from the first names of its three founding partners (Kenton Fiske, Ed Reehil and Joseph Holroyd), was established as a moonlight operation with the goal of licensing their own custom digital clock design.  KENEDJO's design was successful, but its commercial viability ended when Texas Instruments introduced lower power CMOS technology capable of performing the same function more economically.

In 1974, Ken Fiske was asked by a neighbor to look at a home security system he was trying to build that was not functioning properly.  Fiske, then an electrical engineer at Xerox, fixed the system as well as suggested numerous design improvements.  Once operational, the neighbor told friends about the improvements Fiske had made and even recommended him to a local architect who hired Fiske to design and install a customized alarm system for his personal home. This eventually led to Fiske reuniting his KENEDJO moonlighting partners to design and install custom alarm systems for the sizable referral base generated from the successful installation of the architect's system.

KENEDJO was renamed to SenDEC (stands for Sensing Digital Electronic Controls) in 1976 and the three founding partners quit their day jobs shortly thereafter to run the company full time.  SenDEC's main mission was to design, manufacture and install security systems for the residential and commercial markets. In 1979, SenDEC launched its System 8 security system - the first microprocessor based security system known on the market and recipient of Design News Magazine's 10 best consumer technical ideas of the year.

To help pay the bills and fund the development of its security system product line, SenDEC also performed electronics design services for local companies where it quickly gained recognition for its work.  In 1985, Joe Holroyd bought out the security systems portfolio allowing SenDEC to focus all its efforts on satisfying the high level of demand created for the company's design-engineering services.

Contract Electronics Manufacturing Services (EMS) Takes Center Stage

By the mid-1980s, the company had earned a solid reputation for exceptional quality processes and customer service. The company flourished, serving the electronics design needs of Xerox, Kodak and other leading manufacturers in Upstate New York.  To meet the growing demand for their services, SenDEC expanded into contract electronics manufacturing, while continuing to offer customers the design engineering expertise they’d come to expect.  SenDEC was now a well-established contract electronics manufacturing company that provided customers with cost-effective, high quality PCB (printed circuit board) design, production and sub-assembly services.

The Products Group is Born

One of SenDEC’s early contract manufacturing customers was a company with a novel idea: solid-state hour meters for gasoline engines.  Herb Ley, the owner of a lawnmower dealership knew his business made more money on service than sales, but he needed a way to remind owners to bring their machines in for a tune-up.  His vision was a digital hour meter with a service alarm that would be simple for the user to install.  Ley and his fledgling company, SIPAP Electronics, enlisted SenDEC to help him design, prototype and manufacture the meter.  Initially skeptical of the product’s potential, Fiske witnessed the demand for the SIPAP Maintenance Meter at a national lawn equipment trade show in 1990 where it was awarded the EXPO '90 Innovative Products Award.  SenDEC was provided with an opportunity to acquire SIPAP Electronics, which it completed in 1992 – resulting in the birth of SenDEC’s Products Group.  Product line extensions and design improvements soon followed in addition to a US Patent being awarded to SenDEC for its meter design.

SenDEC Today

SenDEC Corporation is now one of the fastest growing companies in the nation. The company is organized into two independent business units: the Contract Electronics Manufacturing (CEM) Group and the Products Group.

SenDEC’s CEM Group provides contract electronics design for manufacturability, prototyping, PCB (printed circuit board) and electromechanical assembly, turnkey box build assembly, test and rework services.  Its client base includes startups, mid-sized companies, and Fortune 500 corporations worldwide serving the commercial/industrial, consumer, energy, medical, military and telecommunications markets.  In an industry marked by offshore outsourcing, SenDEC’s CEM Group offers an experienced, onshore alternative that can deliver higher quality at lower total cost – giving customers a competitive edge.

The SenDEC Products Group manufactures its own family of digital monitoring, display and control devices that include solid-state electronic hour meters, tachometers, battery fuel gauges and engine monitors for the industrial, home & garden and racing industries to name but a few. These are marketed under the SenDEC name, private labeled to OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) and sourced globally through its distributor network. SenDEC has continued to expand its product line and channel as well as its worldwide reputation for reliability and value, which has resulted in millions of unit sales in over 40 countries to date.

While SenDEC’s CEM and Product Groups operate separate lines of business, they share the commitment to quality and customer service that has been a SenDEC tradition for over 30 years.

SenDEC Overview

SenDEC Key Milestones