HERSTAL, BELGIUM – Firearm manufacturer FN Herstal recently invested in its own clean-room production line for Surface Mounted Devices to ensure availability for its own weapon systems, and is now offering production of components to third parties.

THAI BINH PROVINCE, VIETNAM – Compal Electronics has purchased a $30 million plot of land in Vietnam to build a new plant and expand production capacity.

TAIPEI – Trendforce reported that the global production volume of smartphones in the first quarter was only 250 million units – marking a 19.5% YoY decrease and a historic low in quarterly production since 2014.

WASHINGTON – Global semiconductor industry sales were $40 billion during in April, an increase of 0.3% compared to the previous month's total of $39.8 billion and 21.6% less than the April 2022 total of $50.9 billion, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association.