A couple industry articles.... Nat PS I like the "explosive demand" for 2-mm connectors. ----------------------------------------------------------- Design News, April 23, 2001, Departments; Editorial; Pg. 13, 321 words, Life in the not-so-fast lane, By Karen Auguston Field, Chief Editor April 23, 2001 SECTION: Departments; Editorial; Pg. 13 LENGTH: 321 words HEADLINE: Life in the not-so-fast lane BYLINE: By Karen Auguston Field, Chief Editor BODY: Despite radar patrols, speed traps, and costly fines, our nation's efforts to put the brakes on speeding drivers have made little impact. Boston drivers, whose only realistic limitations on speed are the equations of relativity, are an excellent example. I, however, have come up with a solution that works. Post speed limits in metric units. I proved it recently while driving across Morocco. There speed limits are posted in kilometers, just like virtually everywhere else on the planet except the U.S. and the U.K., where at least they have a better excuse! During a cross-country trek, I tore my eyes away from the exotic sights long enough to realize that our rental car--with my lead-footed husband at the wheel--was not exactly hustling along. I'm not sure what the maximum land speed of a donkey is, but I'm positive a few of them passed us on the road to Marrakech. Notwithstanding the fact that our Fiat began to shake violently at about 100 km/hour, I was curious. Why did this speed demon seated next to me have no compulsion whatsoever to drive the 120 km/hour speed limit, much less exceed it? His answer: "It doesn't make any sense, but when the needle on the speedometer hits triple digits, I feel like I'm going really fast." Can this kind of psychological governor work on all speeders? One shortcoming of using the metric system is that it will probably only be effective on people who have to do the conversion in their heads--in other words, every U.S. citizen currently holding a valid driver's license. But perhaps we need to consider a different system of units. A speed limit of 65 miles/hour in Base 8 (101) would meet the 3-digit psychological thresh hold. So would Roman numerals (LXV), which would be a heck of a lot more interesting. But, hey, what about Binary (1000001)? Just trying to keep track of all those digits would make us all forget we were in a hurry to get somewhere! ----------------------------------------------------------- Purchasing, April 19, 2001, Departments; Electronics; Pg. 47, 1050 words, Supply conditions improve for 2-mm HM connectors, Staff April 19, 2001 SECTION: Departments; Electronics; Pg. 47 LENGTH: 1050 words HEADLINE: Supply conditions improve for 2-mm HM connectors BYLINE: Staff BODY: Leadtimes are returning to normal for 2-mm hard metric (HM) connectors, which are used primarily in telecommunications equipment. Because of a slowing economy, weaker demand and high inventory levels, leadtimes are falling back to the 10-week range as opposed to last year when delivery times stretched to as much as 40 weeks. The 2-mm connectors provide high-density and high-speed signal integrity for telecommunications, transmission equipment, digital cross connects and networking applications. In many cases, 2-mm HM connectors were hard to come by last year because of explosive demand from the telecommunications sector, which resulted in an allocation situation where leadtimes shot out to about 40 weeks. The worldwide 2-mm hard metric (HM) connector shipments were $876 million in 2000 and are forecast to reach $1.8 billion by 2005, with a compound annual growth rate of 15.4%, according to Fleck Research, Santa Ana, Calif. Even with the economic slowdown, connector manufacturers expect healthy growth in 2001. For instance, Molex Inc. is forecasting more than 30% growth for its backplane products this year. Similarly, Tyco Electronics sees strong demand particularly from optical networking and wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) markets, which will drive growth in the 30%-40% range this year. Slower demand in combination with more production capacity brought online by major manufacturers such as FCI USA, Molex Inc., Tyco Electronics and new players including Fujitsu Takamisawa and Packard-Hughes Interconnect (PHI) has eased availability problems. "We find that demand is much lower than it was a few months ago. OEM demand has decreased; they aren't selling as many boxes. As a result, the supply chain has found itself in an inventory situation where they are trying to support OEM demand that is no longer there," says David Brearley, product group manager for backplane products at Molex Inc., Lisle, Ill. Additional production capacity will spell relief for many buyers after battling long leadtimes of about 20 to 40 weeks during most of last year. Connector manufacturers now report leadtimes at less than 10 weeks, which is a dramatic turnaround from last year. "We were allocating product as late as January, but now we have a four to six week leadtime," Brearley says. "In a way it's a chance for us to catch our breath because we've been working so hard to expand capacity over the past couple of years. It's been a race and this allows us to get on top of it and meet our committed delivery dates every time," he adds. FCI USA Inc., Etters, Pa., more than doubled its capacity for its 2-mm connectors last year, which will enable the company to bring deliveries back to a six-to-eight-week range by the second quarter. However, slackening demand has also contributed to shorter deliveries. The telecommunications companies had very aggressive growth plans, but all of a sudden demand far exceeded supply as of the November-December timeframe, says Bob Thornton, product marketing manager for Fujitsu Takamisawa America Inc., Sunnyvale, Calif. "They're experiencing a slowdown that is expected to run anywhere from six months to one year and that is having an impact on component demand and capacity," Thornton adds. To help ease the availability problem and meet future demand, two connector manufacturers entered the 2-mm HM connector market this year. In January, Fujitsu Takamisawa America Inc. began to roll out its line of 2-mm connectors. Deliveries for the product range between six to eight weeks. PHI began shipping its neone 1 million 2-mm HM connectors this year. Leadtimes for female connectors are four to six weeks and about 10 to 12 weeks for custom male connectors. Product is available through its existing distribution network. "This market is looking for industry-standard capability as well as multiple sources," says Dr. Eric Jensen, 2-mm hard metric value stream manager for Packard-Hughes Interconnect (PHI), a subsidiary of Delphi Automotive Systems, Irvine, Calif. "We saw a real need [in the communications, datacommunications and telecommunications marketplace] for high-speed connectors. If we truly wanted to follow our customer's technical road map, then we had to look at what they need today as well as in the future," says Gail Miller, director of marketing for PHI. Although demand has slowed, many connector manufacturers are moving ahead with production capacity plans for this year. Although certain segments of the telecommunications market have softened, demand remains high for this type of connector, according to PHI. Miller says there is still constrained supply for second-tier customers. Brearley says the way Molex has tooled its VHDM and HSD production lines makes it much easier for the company to meet either an uptick or slowdown in demand. "We use the same process for making all of those products. If demand turns out to be high for the HSD family and not so high for another product, then we can adapt that increment of capacity for those products," he says. The slowdown gives manufacturers a chance to take a breath to focus on product improvements and expansion. While buyers may have expected lower prices because of excessive capacity, connector makers say prices remain stable for the 2-mm connectors. Many of them have progressive price reductions already built into their strategy plans year to year so they don't anticipate dramatic price erosion due to the slowdown. "There's been a lot of competition for a long time and there's not a lot of room for prices to dramatically go down. But there will be pressure as people try to gain a piece of business," Brearley says. Tyco Electronics, Harrisburg, Pa., expects there will be some additional pressure put on the industry as more competitors enter the market and if added capacity comes online. Five percent erosion in prices this year will not surprise the company, according to a company spokesperson. A rebound in the second half of 2001 for 2-mm connector makers centers on the health of the telecommunications sector, particularly for broadband services such as DSL, optical transmission, wireless services and cable TV. But 2-mm connector manufacturers say they will be ready to meet demand.
