Circuits Assembly Online Magazine - Current

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DENVER, CO – Ron Huston, former owner and CEO of Advanced Circuits, has joined Advanced Assembly as director of marketing.

Huston will focus on sales to engineers who need surface mount parts placed on PCBs in fewer than two days.

The Denver-based provider of SMT services said its staff grew 51% in 2008.

SAN JOSE -- Flextronics will lay off up to 30% of its staff in Beijing, according to local media reports.

The EMS company will also close its Beijing R&D center, China Tech News today reported, quoting an unnamed company source.

HELSINKI – Elektrobit will lay off 170 staff worldwide as part of a restructuring plan aimed at saying €10 million per year.

EB will also cut certain programs and reduce some subcontracting.

The measures come on the heels of an October announcement in which the company said it would cut 42 jobs as part of a plan to cut costs by €30 million a year.

During the second half of 2008, EB will take up to €5 million in nonrecurring restructuring costs and write-offs related to the layoffs.

LOS ALTOS, CA – Despite deteriorating economic conditions, third-quarter global PC shipments grew 14.8% year-over-year. The double-digit unit gains were created by strong demand in developing countries and the continuing transition to laptop computers, says Henderson Ventures.

However, the full force of the credit crunch is expected to pound down fourth-quarter demand worldwide. As a result, global unit shipments growth will decelerate from 14.7% last year to 10.8% in 2008, says the firm.

Severe regional recessions will constrain PC markets to only a 3.8% gain in 2009, Henderson adds. Without WiMax, and netbooks, unit growth rates would be negative during 2009.

An economic rebound, along with reinvigorated replacement cycles and technological advancements such as USB 3.0, will help create a 13.6% jump in PC shipments during 2010.

The combination of small unit PC gains, along with declining average sale prices, will create a financial downdraft for computer equipment manufacturers next year. World production values will fall 2.3% after a 5.2% gain this year, says Henderson.

With the exception of China, all the major computer-manufacturing regions will experience negative growth in 2009. US output will fall 6.2% next year, followed by a muted 4.1% advance in 2010.

China will achieve only a 2.2% gain in 2009, followed by a 12.7% burst in 2010, says the research firm.

TEMPE, AZ – Economic activity in the manufacturing sector failed to grow in November for the fourth consecutive month, and the overall economy contracted for the second consecutive month, says the Institute for Supply Management.

The November PMI registered 36.2%, down 2.7 points. New orders fell 4.3 percentage points to 27.9%. Production was 31.5%, down from 34.1%, while inventories dropped 5.2 points to 39.1%. Customer inventories remained at 55%, and the backlog of orders fell 2.5 points to 27%. A reading above 50% generally indicates growth.

"When comparing November to October, the PMI indicates a continuing rapid rate of contraction in manufacturing. New orders have contracted for 12 consecutive months, and are at the lowest level since June 1980 when the index registered 24.2%. Order backlogs have fallen to the lowest level since ISM began tracking the backlog of orders index in January 1993. The prices index at 25.5% indicates commodity prices continue to decline at a rapid rate. This is the lowest reading for the index since May 1949 when it registered 20.1%," said ISM spokesperson Norbert J. Ore.