U.S. manufacturing in October expanded at its highest rate since 2018, driven by the strongest orders growth since 2004 and an uptick in factory employment. The Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing index, the PMI, grew 3.9 percent to 59.3 in October, while new orders increased 7.7 percent to reach 67.9. Any reading above 50 indicates…
Just five years ago, Advanced Micro Devices’ (AMD) acquisition of Xilinx would have sent shockwaves through the distribution channel. Xilinx and archrival Altera, now owned by Intel, were the last holdouts of a practice called shelf-sharing, where two competitors refuse to be sold side by side — “share shelf ” — at a single distributor.…
Lynn Torrel, Flex’s chief supply chain and procurement officer, was three months on the job when a deadly viral outbreak locked down Wuhan, China. The global electronics manufacturer knew its employees, operations and supply chain faced an unprecedented challenge. “In mid-January we were hearing about the outbreak in Asia, and through talking with our suppliers,…
The phrase you hear a lot from supply chain executives this year is they can’t control the decisions of their suppliers and customers, nor can they constrain a global pandemic. But manufacturing and procurement organizations can mitigate the impact of such events and are focusing on things they can manage. Gartner outlines three trends that…
U.S. manufacturing activity cooled in September but remained well within expansion territory for the fourth straight month. The Institute for Supply Management’s PMI slipped to 55.4, or 0.6 percent, from 56 in August as the forward-looking new orders index declined. Any reading above 50 indicates growth. New orders decreased to 60.2 from a reading of…
The global coronavirus has upended many of the metrics used to forecast supply, demand, economic activity and financial stability. Two electronics associations – the IPC and ECIA – report electronics markets are recovering, but forward momentum is decelerating. “The economy improved over the last month, but it is clear that momentum is slowing and future…
The Newark electronics catalog – once known as the “Bible of the industry” — has made significant progress under parent Avnet Inc. and expects additional investment will boost its e-commerce capabilities and restore historically high profit margins. Newark was acquired in 1996 by the UK’s Premier Farnell group. The Newark and Farnell catalogs underwent a…
Disasters have a way of elevating procurement operations to saviors of the day, week or month. But once a crisis has passed, purchasing reverts back to its identity as a corporate cost center. Covid-19 could strengthen purchasing’s position as a corporate risk-management resource. The pandemic has raised the supply chain to a topic of national…
Machine learning (ML) is positioned to solve a range of supply chain challenges today, but commercializing ML applications lags behind research. Businesses that stand to gain from ML solutions are helping accelerate that process. Last week, MIT’s Computer Science Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) research alliance launched, via webinar, MachineLearningApplications@CSAIL to develop applications for the latest…
There aren’t may start-ups in electronics distribution, and even fewer that specialize in end-of-life (EOL) components. Flip Electronics has just celebrated its fifth year focusing on the “bleeding edge” of technology. Flip manages EOL parts for component suppliers and customers. “I’d say five years is proof of concept,” said Jason Murphy, Flip’s founder and CEO.…