Advanced Plating Technologies (APT) is a fourth generation, family owned metal finishing job shop located in Milwaukee, WI that provides electrolytic and electroless plating as well as powder coating and passivation services. APT is located in downtown Milwaukee within the Haymarket Square district just north of the Fiserv Forum. The company operates nine production lines in three facilities with a total of 55,000 ft^2 contained on the same city block. APT employees 70 persons across multiple production shifts which positions the company in the top 10 percentile of size of job shops across the country.
Advanced Plating Technologies was originally founded in 1948 as Artistic Plating Company by James H. Lindstedt, Harry C. Lindstedt and Earl Herrington. Artistic Plating Company began as a simple job-shop that serviced retail accounts as well as a high mix of small to medium volume production orders. The founders chose the name “Artistic Plating” due to the company’s decorative finishing work of both private heirlooms and religious artifacts. Artistic Plating Company grew steadily through the years, developing a commercial/production focus within the regional plumbing, power distribution and industrial markets.
As the company grew in finishing capabilities and engineering expertise, the strategic focus shifted into more technical markets where multi-generational experience in metal finishing could be leveraged to provide metal finishing solutions. It was recognized that even very large and sophisticated OEMs lacked a core understanding of metal finishing principles. The goal of the company was to fill this void and become a surface engineering resource to our customer base. In 2013 the name of the company was changed to Advanced Plating Technologies to reflect this strategic focus.
Today Advanced Plating Technologies is an industry-leading, ISO 13485:2016 & 9001:2015 certified and ITAR registered job-shop that provides engineered solutions in metal finishing within numerous demanding sectors including the electric vehicle, defense, medical, ammunition/firearm, telecommunication/electronic and power distribution sectors among others. APT engineering and technical sales department provides both new design consulting in surface engineering as well as reverse engineering of existing metal finishing issues such as corrosion failures, solderability, brazing or ultrasonic welding design, adhesion issues. The combination of surface engineering support coupled with a full-service metal finishing job shop with over 70-years of experience make Advanced Plating Technologies unique.