If you were looking to buy a home or condominium, in all likelihood, one of the first things you would do is check current mortgage rates with a mortgage bank or broker. Why? The reasons are obvious and generally well understood. You, if you are like most people, probably don’t have the cash necessary to pay for the home you want. You would need to take out a mortgage to buy your home so you would have to do some planning. What is my budget? Given current, interest rates, what will the monthly payment be on the size mortgage I need? Thirty year fixed? Fifteen year variable? What works for me? In short order, choosing a mortgage product becomes as importantas choosing the house itself.
Just as buying a home is one of the most important decisions an individual may make, building a clean room may be one of the most important decisions a corporation makes, particularly if that corporation is a small to mid-size company with potential cash flow problems.
My friends in the industry tell me that building the wrong clean room is a mistake that can haunt a corporation for years. Too often, the CFO of a corporation decides on the budget for a clean room project based not so much on the long term needs of the company, but on how much cash he or she has on hand. This can be and often is a very short-sighted approach. A company may build what it perceives it can afford, rather than what it truly needs now and for the future.
When considering building a clean room, senior corporate managers should start the process by simply thinking about what their company needs. They should think about what-they need now, and what they think they may need in the future. Next, they should determine what it will cost to build the clean room that suits those needs. Obviously, it is the rare corporate project that gets unlimited funding these days. Budgetary considerations will always be a factor, but the simple truth is that clean rooms are regarded as important and worthy of funding. Financing becomes a means to an end when a company simply can’t afford to make the cash outlay. Financing can be an option that gives the company the particular clean room it needs without adversely affecting the financial health of thefirm.