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News

JACKSON, MI -- EMS provider Sparton Corp. has been awarded an initial $2 million contract to produce assemblies for Raytheon-Network Centric Systems. Additional awards are anticipated over the next three years.

Sparton expects to begin production in February at its Brooksville, FL, facility. The circuit card assemblies are for the F15 AN/APX-114 Long Range Airborne IFF Interrogator System program.

CHENNAI, INDIA -- Avalon Technologies, an electronics manufacturing services provider and a wholly owned subsidiary of U.S.-based Sienna Corp., will break ground this week on a facility outside the Madras Export Processing Zone.

The company is also close to acquiring EMS businesses in India, Japan and the U.S., according to a news report.

SAN JOSE -- Sanmina-SCI has signed a manufacturing services agreement to build digital cinema products for QuVIS Inc.

Sanmina-SCI, a Top Tier EMS provider, will provide QuVIS with unlimited manufacturing capacity, QuVIS said. Under the agreement, product will begin shipping in the first quarter of 2006.

CANNES, FRANCE -- Outsourcing has become such an integral part of successful business practice that many organisations are embarking on outsourcing programmes almost without thinking. Research firm Gartner today warned against such compulsive outsourcing and advised organisations to begin a more disciplined approach to multisourcing in order to achieve business growth and agility.

SAN JOSE -- The Semiconductor Industry Association today applauded congressional action to provide a significant increase in federal funding for the National Science Foundation in 2006.

Congress appropriated $5.65 billion for the NSF, an increase of 3.3% over last year.

PALO ALTO, CA -- IPCore Technologies Corp., China's largest design service company, has selected the Agilent Technologies 93000 SOC series for testing digital, mixed-signal and RF devices.

Agilent is also collaborating with IPCore on test-program and load-board design.

"[We] found that the Agilent 93000 system offered a scalable platform with the flexibility, accuracy and speed we require," said Randy Cao, senior director of turnkey operations, IPCore. "Agilent has demonstrated its strong commitment and support capability to the high-end SOC test market in China."

Agilent has installed more than 1,000 9300 systems worldwide.

SHANGHAI -- Third quarter handset sales in China reached 20.97 million units, a record, according to a media report today.

The shipments were valued at 31.8 billion yuan (RMB8.2:US$1), according to a report from Chinese Sina.com, quoting sources at China-based CCID Consulting.

Handset shipments are forecast to top 88 million units this year, CCID predicted, up 20.5% over last year.

Nokia was the top vendor, with a 19.3% share, followed by Motorola (12%), Samsung Electronics (9.5%), Ningbo Bird (8%), and Lenovo (5.1%).

Foreign OEMs are pushing out domestic brands: Chinese phone makers reported a 41.3% share for the quarter, the lowest mark of the year, the report said.

JACKSON, MI -- Sparton Corp. on Wednesday was awarded a $3.6 million judgment by a jury that determined the EMS provider did not breach its duties in the manufacture of product for a pair of defendants.

The jury awarded Sparton damages in the amount of $3.6 million, $1.9 million of which was for raw materials. An appeal by the defendants, Util-LINK LLC and National Rural Telecommunications Cooperative, remains possible.

SANTA CLARA, CA -- SensArray Corp. has relocated from Fremont, CA, to a larger site in Santa Clara, the company said today.

The new headquarters, located at 5451 Patrick Henry Drive, is 70% larger than the previous site.

SensArray makes front- and back-end process optimization tools and measurement systems for collecting and analyzing data for semiconductor processing and flat panel fabrication.

SEATTLE -- With sales of the Xbox 360 gaming console expected to top 3 million in the first three months after its launch, the EMS firms building the units are primed for a busy quarter.

The XBox 360 is scheduled to reach stores on Nov. 22. Microsoft said yesterday said it expects to sell 2.75 million to 3 million units in the first 90 days after the launch date.

METHUEN, MA -- Shareholders of flexible circuit manufacturer Parlex Corp. today approved the sale of the company to Johnson Electric Holdings. The deal is expected to close this week.

NEEDHAM, MA – PTC, a supplier of product lifecycle management software, reported revenue of $195.1 million for the fourth fiscal quarter ending Sept. 30, 2005, up 15% from $170.1 million for the same period last year.