The Metal Market Standard
Your part is made by a factory that had to qualify first
Metal Market owns no machines. That is the point: instead of selling you whatever our own shop happens to be good at, we place your part with the partner whose equipment and experience actually fit it, out of a network of more than a hundred audited Indian manufacturers.
Which only works if the network is genuinely vetted. Here is exactly what a shop goes through before it is allowed to quote your drawing, and what keeps it there afterwards.
- 100+
- vetted manufacturing partners
- 8
- stages before a shop can quote
- 10
- first orders supervised
- 95%+
- on-time, in-full delivery
Qualification
Eight stages before a shop sees your drawing
None of these stages is a formality, and a shop can fail at any of them. The order matters too: nothing is shown a customer drawing before the confidentiality agreement at stage four.
- 01
We approach them
Partners are recruited, not signed up. We go to shops whose equipment and track record already suggest they can hold what our customers ask for, so the first conversation is about capability rather than interest.
- 02
Qualification review
Machine list, capacity, materials handled, quality organisation, and the export work they already do for other customers. We are equally direct about what partnering with us involves, because a shop that is surprised later is a late shipment later.
- 03
On-site audit
One of our auditors walks the floor. Quality management, measurement equipment and its calibration, how batches are identified, and how the workforce is treated. A shop that looks right on paper and wrong in person does not join.
- 04
Legal and compliance checks
Registrations, licences and background checks, then a formal agreement — including the confidentiality obligations that cover customer drawings before anyone has seen one.
- 05
Platform access
Only once all of the above is clear does a shop get access to quote work at all. There is no route onto the platform that skips the audit.
- 06
Technical onboarding
We train the partner on how we expect drawings read, tolerances reported, parts packed and problems escalated. Most quality failures in offshore sourcing are communication failures, so this stage exists to remove that excuse.
- 07
The first ten orders, supervised
A supply chain manager watches every one of a new partner's first ten orders, with our own quality control before and after production. This is where a partner is actually proved, and where some of them stop.
- 08
Recurring audit
Partners are re-audited on a two-year cycle rather than once at the start, with spot checks at the sites we use most in between. Qualification is a standing requirement, not a badge from the year they joined.
The audit
What our auditor looks at on the floor
An audit is not a certificate check. It follows material through the building — from the day it arrives to the day a finished part is packed — and looks at how the people doing the work are treated while it happens.
Quality system
- ISO and AS certifications held
- Who owns quality, and their authority
- Written quality policy and measurable objectives
Traceability
- Raw material in and out, with dates and quantities
- Process records for each batch
- The standard they hold their own subcontractors to
Incoming goods
- How arriving material is identified
- Inspection of incoming stock, and the records of it
- Stock rotation, so old material is not quietly used first
Production and packaging
- Batch identification on the floor
- Machine list and equipment condition
- In-process inspection, not just final inspection
Finished goods
- Identification of finished parts
- Final inspection against the drawing
- Storage and packing conditions
Working conditions
- Hiring practices and workplace protections
- Non-discrimination
- Working hours, wages and how they are paid
When it goes wrong
A non-conforming part is our problem to close out
Parts do occasionally come out wrong; anyone who tells you otherwise has not made many. What matters is what happens next, and who does it.
A non-conformance triggers a corrective action plan with the partner who made it. They establish the root cause and change the process, not just the batch — and we verify that on the next order rather than take it on trust. You are told what was found. Repeat failures cost a partner their place in the network, which is the only version of this that actually works.
Certifications
What the network can certify to
Metal Market holds AS9100 D and ISO 9001:2015. Across the partner network, parts can be produced to ISO 9001, IATF 16949, AS9100 and ISO 13485 — so aerospace, automotive and medical work can be placed with a shop already certified for it rather than one hoping to be.
Every lot ships with material certificates and a dimensional inspection report as standard. First-article inspection, full material traceability and certificate copies are available on request — ask for them with the RFQ and they are quoted in, not added afterwards.
Send us the part you are least sure about
An engineer will tell you which partner it suits, what it will cost landed, and how long it will take.