Circuits Assembly Online Magazine - Features

FRAMINGHAM, MA - The consumer semiconductor market will more than double between 2004 and 2009, expanding from just over $14 billion to almost $30 billion, a new IDC study predicts. The market will experience the fastest year-over-year growth rates through 2007.

Consumer semiconductor growth is fueled by increasing importance in existing and developing end-products in the "digital home" environment. Consumer semiconductors are the enablers of both the underlying technology and the consumer-facing features of the digital home.

"The consumer semiconductor market is one of the fastest growing and most challenging segments in the semiconductor industry," said IdaRose Sylvester, senior research analyst at IDC. "With opportunity comes significant technological, market and competitive challenges, and only the most strategically-focused semiconductors vendors are going to benefit substantially from this growth."

The consumer semiconductor landscape is on the verge of dramatic evolution. Some markets such as digital TV represent great growth and potential for new entrants, but other markets, such as DVD offer moderate expansion and exceptional challenges. Due to these forces, the market in 2009 will be dramatically different than it is today.

NEWARK, NY -- IEC Electronics, a publicly held EMS firm, today reported second quarter net income of $73,000 on sales of $4.7 million.

For the quarter ended April 1, sales dropped 36% year-on-year, due to a decline in orders from two major customers. Net income dropped from $124,000 last year.

In a press statement, chairman and CEO W. Barry Gilbert said, "The business has been restructured delivering solid gross profits and excellent inventory turns even though our sales reflect the previously reported loss of Motorola and Teradyne, which historically were a majority of the company's business."

IEC has cut $1.5 million annually from its overhead during the past six months, Gilbert added.

The company landed two new accounts that are eventually expected to be worth $6 million to $10 million annually in sales.

Another customer said it would cease its business with IEC in July and bring its work in-house.

The top five customers accounted for 71% of sales for the quarter, down five points from last year.

For the quarter, IEC took restructuring costs of $41,000.

NEENAH, WI -- Despite a jump in sales, top tier EMS provider Plexus Corp. reported a loss of $4.5 million in the second quarter due to costs associated with the closure of a Washington plant.

Revenue rose 20.1% to $305.5 million from $254.3 million last year. The results beat analysts' consensus of $285 million in sales.

Plexus reported a net profit of $3.5 million a year ago.

The compay took $9.8 million in one-time charges related to the closure of the Bothell, WA, manufacturing facility, and to recognize a change in scope for a shop floor data-collection system.

Dean Foate, president and CEO, said, "Looking ahead, we remain confident about attaining revenue for the full fiscal year near the high end of our previously announced target range of 15 to 18%, despite the unsettled outlook for key end markets."

Plexus guided for third-quarter revenue of $305 million to $315 million, and forecasts operating earnings per share of 13 cents to 15 cents.

The company said its bottom line in the fourth quarter should continue to benefit from operational improvements, which will include advancing the new facility in Penang, Malaysia, to a modest profit.

SAN JOSE -- Sanmina-SCI Corp. today reported a stunning net loss of $1.04 billion for its second fiscal quarter ended April 2.

The EMS maker, the third largest in the world, said revenues rose 1% to $2.89 billion, at the low end of previous guidance, while non-GAAP net income was up 9% to $29.3 million. However, it was sunk by one-time charges of $600 million for impairment of goodwill. It was the 18th straight quarter of one-time charges for Sanmina-SCI.

SAN FRANCISCO - Fabrinet, an engineering and electromechanical manufacturing services company, will purchase the manufacturing facilities located in Fuzhou, China, from JDS Uniphase.

The deal is expected to be completed by June 30. Terms were not revealed.

Last week, JDS said it would transfer its Ewing and Mountain Lakes, NJ, manufacturing facilities to Fabrinet. JDS has contracted assembly work to Fabrinet since 2000.

The Fuzhou deal includes the 225,000 sq. ft. Fuzhou plant, which makes optical components, and its 500 employees. Fuzhou port sits at the mouth of the Minjiang River in South China.

Last December, Fabrinet acquired JDS Uniphase's manufacturing facilities in Singapore and Bintan, Indonesia.

HERNDON, VA - Saying industry "must have means of differentiating RoHS-compliant products," a leading industry consortium today called for the use of unique part numbers for such parts.

The International Electronics Manufacturing Initiative says the majority of its OEM and EMS members "strongly support" the change. In a statement, iNEMi said:

"Demonstrating and certifying compliance with RoHS is a complex undertaking made more difficult by the electronics industry's distributed design and manufacturing supply chains and the incompatibility between the current tin-lead (SnPb) and RoHS-compliant lead-free manufacturing processes. Industry must have means of differentiating RoHS-compliant products that is common across all of the companies involved in, or contributing to, product manufacture, including component suppliers, component distributors, EMS providers, OEMs and their design partners. We are convinced that the only practical way to accomplish this goal is through separate part numbers that can clearly identify RoHS compliance and manufacturing process compatibility.

iNEMI said support for the switch comes from Alcatel, Celestica, Cray, Dell, Delphi, HP, Intel, Jabil Circuit, Lucent, Microsoft, Plexus, Sanmina-SCI, Solectron, StorageTek and Sun Microsystems.

"Many of our members feel very strongly about this issue, and they came to us, asking that iNEMI issue a position statement to go on record as supporting separate part numbers," said Jim McElroy, executive director and CEO of iNEMI. iNEMI supplied statements from several members supporting the position.

"Celestica is a strong supporter of the introduction of new part numbers for RoHS-compliant components," said Dan Shea, chief technology officer, Celestica. "By assigning unique part numbers for compliant parts, global suppliers would greatly support proper component segregation and handling - driving a smoother transition to RoHS compliance for the electronics industry as a whole."

According to Vivek Gupta, program manager for Intel's Assembly Technology Division, "Intel requires its suppliers to change part numbers when they transition to RoHS-compliant parts and follow the established change control process. Suppliers are expected to mark their RoHS-compliant products per established JEDEC/IPC standards and implement controls to prevent mixing of RoHS-compliant parts."