The new normal of low growth rates is clear. We are unlikely to resume to the double-digit levels once experienced – at least for a while. Saturation across tech verticals, notably smartphones, is also expanding. However, despite these gloomy outlooks, there are markets where strong growth is still on the event horizon: emerging markets. While…
Among the key questions facing the global electronics and semiconductor industry are the creation of value and the development of new growth strategies in the midst of still challenging and conservative market conditions. Given the high rate of mergers & acquisitions (M&A) we’ve been seeing, clearly, there are deep financial pockets that corporations are now…
Historically, the semiconductor and electronics industry is a story of ebb and flow: the cycles of demand and the lulls that follow. Mix in the greater, macro-economic waves of variables that push or pull at consumer confidence and spending and you get a pattern that held out for the better part of several decades. The…
On Friday, EPS posted the breaking news of the 6.4 magnitude earthquake that struck Japan during Thursday evening and reported some of the early information available while what were then believed to be aftershocks continued to affect the area. We made the comparison to the 2011 disaster almost five years and a month to the…
If there’s an example of positive impacts of consolidation on a market, the past few years in the memory sector could well be that example. I have to admit, as a general rule, I’m leery of waves of M&A that push sectors toward oligopolies. Along this vein, I confess to having been concerned during the…
Ongoing consolidation has me sometimes feeling that the semiconductor and electronics industry is a shrinking group of major corporations representing leading sectors. The headlining M&A story of the year—so far– is the Foxconn-Sharp merger penned at the beginning of April, but which began in 2012. The seesaw story of Sharp’s financial troubles plagued the company for…
Certainly the M&A and consolidation story has been big this year for the semiconductor and electronics industry. With this comes a number of changes and adjustments, be they partner or component line shifts, logistics, EOL, pricing and so forth. However these are not, in the least, new moments for our industry. Nestled among the strategic…
There’s much to be said about the spate of consolidations this year, to be sure, as EPS’ Bolaji Ojo recently discussed; there are real industry changes afoot. Certainly, much of the transactional strategies have to do with the views into new market positions, and the opportunities to scale and refine oligopolies — among other competitive…
This month, Verical.Connect and EPS have taken a very close and important look at the cornerstones of quality and anti-counterfeiting strategies in the semiconductor and electronics supply chain. Sourcing and procurement have grown, expanded, and decidedly matured in terms of business operations/processes as well as the role that these departments play in the corporation. Quality…
Earlier this summer Micron Technology Inc., the last of the North American DRAM manufacturers, rejected a $23 billion acquisition bid by the Chinese, state-controlled, Tsinghua Unigroup. The bid was rejected for many reasons, not the least of which was the concern that the U.S. government would block this deal on the basis of national security…