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The branch office service department will act as service hub for the Indian and Southeast Asian markets, according to Jay Kumar, managing director India.
“All service cases will be managed directly by the Indian service team, which is trained by the Swiss headquarters. Essemtec will be able to provide total application solutions plus operator and maintenance trainings,” he said.
The office was founded in 2007 as a liaison site to establish business in the region.
Essemtec India also will open a demo room in Bangalore during the first quarter of 2009. Additionally, the firm will use the facility for customer training and seminars.
Proposals for four iNEMI projects emerged from discussions at the Sustainability Summit: noncompetitive lifecycle assessments for information and communication technology products based on a building block approach using assembly emulators; PVC replacement alternatives, using LCAs to compare PVC vs. PVC-free cables and technical evaluation of alternatives; establishing a market for post-consumer plastics as feedstock for green products (e.g., polycarbonate, ABS — acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene), and establishing electronics applications for post-consumer blended plastics (e.g., housings for power supplies).
Two of these initiates are currently in development, says the consortium. Tom Okrasinski, Alcatel-Lucent, and Todd Myers, Cisco, will champion the Eco-Impact Evaluator for ICT Equipment Initiative (noncompetitive LCAs); and Scott O’Connell, Dell, is championing the PVC alternatives effort.
To become involved in either project, contact Jim Arnold, iNEMI consultant, at jim.arnold@rissastudios.com.
Other areas identified for industry action include working with an IPC standards committee to create a practical industry definition of “halogen-free”; creating an HFR- and PVC-free component and board test specification and metrology, and through traditional volume learning curves, achieving HFR- and PVC-free materials cost, delivery and quality parity.
MINNEAPOLIS -- CyberOptics today lowered its fourth-quarter revenue guidance 24 to 32%, citing the economy and delayed customer acceptance of a large order.
Overall exports were $14.8 billion for the month, beating economists' estimates but still the lowest drop in seven years. Electrical and electronics products make up about 40% ($5.92 billion) of the nation's exports.
Singapore, Japan and the US are the biggest recipients of Malaysian-built products. Exports to the US dropped 17% year-over-year in November, and demand for locally manufactured products from companies such as Dell, Western Digital and Intel slowed. The US was once Malaysia's biggest trading partner but has slipped to third in the past two years.
The privately held company, which manufactures wiping products and supplies consumable items used in cleanrooms, assembly lines, laboratories and manufacturing, has had double-digit growth since it was founded in 2001.
The firm says it is hiring and moving to new corporate headquarters that will quadruple its existing facility.
The privately held manufacturer of wiping products and supplier of consumable items used in cleanrooms, assembly lines, laboratories and manufacturing has seen double-digit growth each year since its 1995 founding.
High-Tech Conversions will be moving to a larger modern manufacturing facility in the first quarter of 2009, as well as ramping production in China, Mexico and Germany.
TAIPEI -- OEM/ODM Micro-Star International will refocus its notebook computer line on the hot netbook market and may spin off its Wind brand of low-cost "nettop" PCs.
NANTOU, TAIWAN – Universal Scientific Industrial Co. reported consolidated net EMS revenues of $21.8 million for the month ended Dec. 31, down 18% sequentially and 55% from the same period last year.
The company, a top 25 global EMS company, reported total sales of $490.4 million for its EMS segment in 2008. EMS makes up 18% of its total sales in Taiwanese dollars.
YAVNE, ISRAEL – Valor Computerized Systems has acquired the assets of PCB Matrix Corp., a provider of EDA library generation tools for both land pattern and schematic symbols. No financial terms were disclosed.
PCB Matrix's software automates custom schematic symbol generation, and adds land pattern generation to Valor’s portfolio.
In a press release, Valor vice president of Design Market Patrick McGoff said, “Extending the value of the ISO-certified content upstream into the design arena is a logical progression for us. We believe the industry will benefit from a streamlined library creation process that has the potential to incorporate manufacturing knowledge into the EDA libraries. This will ultimately lead to more manufacturable designs the first time through.”
“Television, monitor and notebook PC makers are slashing orders for large-sized LCD panels due to weak holiday season sales, reflecting the global downturn in consumer and corporate demand,” said Sweta Dash, senior director of LCD research at iSuppli. “The recession in the global economy has impacted all areas of the electronics value chain, including large-sized LCDs, an area that will continue to struggle into the first quarter of 2009.”
iSuppli defines large-sized LCD panels as those having a diagonal dimension of 10" or more.
The large-sized LCD panel market has been struggling through severe oversupply conditions since the beginning of June, as a result of lower-than-expected panel demand and high levels of inventories building up throughout the LCD supply chain. To make matters worse, the market was pushed back into a state of further oversupply, rather than recovering at the end of September because of the financial crisis that impacted US and global demand in the second half of September, says iSuppli.
“Panel prices are continuing to fall, even though some prices are already at or even less than the cash cost level,” Dash said. “Monitor panel prices have declined 40% to 45% since June. Notebook prices also have decreased 35% to 40% during the same period. Meanwhile, television panel prices have dropped 25% to 30%.”
Some television panel prices have been declining since the first quarter of 2008, while monitor panel prices have been dropping since the end of the second quarter. The average 32" television panel price declined from $335 in January 2008 to the $200 to $210 range by November.
Faced with severe cuts in panel profitability in the third quarter and continued price reductions, LCD suppliers have cut their utilization rates in the fourth quarter. Some suppliers already are reducing utilization rates 40%, and are running their fabs at 60% capacity. Some fabs are even running below the 50% level, according to the research firm. Most panel suppliers are planning to maintain this level of utilization in the first quarter of 2009.
Despite the drop in utilization rates in the fourth quarter, the panel market is still suffering from oversupply. Most brand manufacturers and retailers are reporting slow holiday and corporate sales in the fourth quarter. They are reducing target inventory levels drastically and canceling orders. This has caused inventories to swell throughout the supply chain, says iSuppli.
iSuppli has reduced its large-sized LCD forecast for 2008 and 2009 as a result of the recent financial crisis and the recession in the US and worldwide. Although the change in the unit shipment forecast is still less than 5% for 2008, the revenue forecast for the year is reduced 8%. However, the revenue impact may be even greater in 2009, unless the market can stabilize by the third quarter.
“Oversupply and drastic price reductions are nothing new to the large-sized LCD panel market, as the industry generally uses the strategy of capacity expansion, price reduction and demand creation to boost sales and increase the LCD's dominance in the display market,” Dash observed. “However, this time the industry ended up being in double trouble, when panel suppliers faced the worldwide economic and financial crisis right after confronting their own industry oversupply issues in the third quarter of 2008.
“There has been some concern about cash issues among suppliers, especially smaller component makers, which may significantly disrupt the LCD supply chain. It may take the LCD industry a long time to recover, even when market demand returns.
