News
MIAMI - A number of high-profile OEMs and EMS providers presenting at an analysts conference yesterday gave mixed outlooks for 2005, and at least one EMS company suggested further acquisitions are in store.
Benchmark Electronics chief executive Cary Fu "suggested that an acquisition of assets capabilities in Asia in on the horizon," Deutsche Bank analyst Chris Whitmore said today. Fu made the remarks at DB's hardware conference here yesterday.
ATLANTA - UP Media Group has issued a call for abstracts for PCB Design Conference East, the annual conference for PCB designers and engineers.
Presentations of 30 minutes, one or two hours, and half-day are sought. One- and two-day tutorials are also sought, organizers said.
For consideration, go to www.pcbeast.com
for an online submission form, or e-mail conference chair Andy Shaughnessy, ashaughnessy@upmediagroup.com. Abstracts
are due March 15.
Submissions
should include a suggested course title, length, a short description of the target
audience, a detailed 100- to 300-word abstract, and a short bio.
PCB East will be held Oct. 10-14, in Manchester, NH. The trade show is sponsored by Printed Circuit Design & Manufacture and Circuits Assembly.
The fourth-quarter net loss narrowed but sales declined sharply. Revenue and earnings were hurt by an unanticipated volume decline from a major customer that operates in a cyclical sector, the company said.
For the year the company generated $5.1 million in cash from operations. down from $5.5 million for 2003.
In a press release, John Caldwell, president and chief executive, said, "We expect to produce sequential revenue growth by the second quarter of 2005 and continue with positive momentum through the back half of the year."
For the fourth quarter the company reported a net loss of
$2.5 million on sales of $48 million. SMTC took $700,000 in restructuring
and other one-time charges. SMTC lost $2.6 million on revenue of $76.9 million a year ago.
For the year, the EMS maker posted a net loss of $4.5 million on net sales of $475.4 million.
For the quarter net sales were up 47%
increase from last year on higher demand for semiconductor capital equipment, aerospace and
defense, industrial and medical gear. The net loss was $1.3 million, vs. a net loss of $6.1 million.
For the year, the net loss was $4.5 million, vs. a net loss of $34.3 million in 2003.
The operating loss improved to $400,000 from $5.5 million
a year ago. Sequentially, fourth-quarter net sales decreased 10%, due to lower
demand for semiconductor tools.
Chief information officers predict spending growth of 5.9% over the next 12 months, up from 5.4% reported during January, according the magazine's monthly poll.
Telecom equipment and infrastructure software had the largest number of CIOs who predict increases.
"The February results are somewhat reassuring" said Gary Beach, group publisher of CXO Media, the company that publishes CIO. "After three straight monthly declines, it is a good sign we are seeing some leveling off. CIOs are now facing
a more constrained environment and must make hard choices between infrastructure maintenance and system upgrades. I believe in the coming months we will see a slow but steady rate of growth. However, unless the CEO and CFO loosen the
purse strings, we will not see explosive growth."
"Although IT spending projections improved modestly from January levels, CIO spending expectations have declined noticeably from last fall," said Chris Whitmore, director IT hardware research for Deutsche Bank Securities. "The upswing
this month in the telecom and infrastructure software markets is one highlight in the data. However, it remains to be seen if this is the beginning of a trend."
AYLESBURY, ENGLAND -- EMS company TT Electronics has acquired the contract assembly arm of Dage Holdings Ltd. No financial details were made available.
Dage Electronics Integrated Systems has sites in
Suzhou, China, and the
U.K.
TT Electronics called the asset acquisition "complementary," saying
DEIS has strong backplane design and manufacturing capabilities.
