The next 10 years of smart home technology will focus on developments that will apply to more than just living spaces. Technology is not always smart. Technology that consumers can understand, afford, and use properly is smart. Technology that saves power and is good for the environment is also smart. Too often, the technology thatRead More

Profitability Killers (Price Erosion + Rising Raw Material Costs) In Part 2 of the 10-year snapshot of the connector industry, Ron Bishop looks at price erosion and rising material costs. A sharp decline in demand will automatically produce a decline in profits. We experienced that in 2001, 2002, and 2009 when connector sales declined -18.9%,Read More

Demand Falling for Backplane-Based Systems Let’s face reality, folks: The demand for backplane-based systems is falling like a refrigerator down an elevator shaft (as is the demand for copper-based backplane connectors). There are several logical reasons for this precipitous decline, and a set of laws that explain why this is happening. But first, we haveRead More

10-Year Snapshot of the Connector Industry The phrase “significant change” doesn’t adequately describe what happened in the connector industry over the past 10 years. Specifically, between 2003 and 2013, the connector industry: Experienced roller coaster swings in connector demand, setting new industry records for declines and increases Suffered the worst price erosion in decades, followedRead More

Rise of the Industrial Robots When Hon Hai Precision Industry Company Chairman Terry Gou announced in 2011 that Foxconn, its wholly owned subsidiary, would install one million robots over the next three years in its factories to replace workers and do “simple” work, he probably did not actually intend to install that many industrial robotsRead More

Why Robots Won’t Replace People: Industrial Q&A with TTI Inc. – Lew LaFornara What is the state of the industrial market for electronic components, particularly for connectors and why robots won’t replace people are discussed in this Industrial Q&A with TTI Inc. The industrial market is the one segment that is most closely tied toRead More

December 2013 – The server market has become a $50 billion segment of the computer industry, about the same size as the world connector market. With the advent of cloud storage and “Big Data,” many expect the server market to continue to grow, and to grow substantially. That could be a false assumption.

December 2013 – 2013 is almost in the books. Did it meet, exceed, or fall short of expectations? Ron Bishop takes a look at the numbers to see how we’ll be ringing out this year.

November 2013 – Three quarters into the calendar year, how is the connector industry performing? Overall, will 2013 be boom or bust or somewhere in between? Bishop & Associates runs the numbers for the year so far and makes its forecast for Q4.

October 2013 – The combined annual revenue of all the market sectors tracked was $4.3 trillion in 2012, an increase of 4.9% over 2011. Of the 13 market sectors, instrumentation was the third-fastest growing market sector in 2012, at 5.4% year-over-year with combined revenues of $29 billion. Profitability was $3.5 billion at 12.1% of sales.

September 2013 – In 2013, governments and defense agencies — from the US to China to the euro zone — are being asked to justify defense spending against a broad range of domestic priorities. Domestic demands for austerity and social investment are eroding previous commitment to high levels of defense spending by many nations. Defense is still the first priority of many governments; however, it is becoming more difficult for the armed services and industry to plan in this budgetary environment.

September 2013 – Year-over-year heavy duty transportation market sales growth slowed substantially starting in 4Q11 and has been negative in 1Q13 and 2Q13, while sequentially, 2Q13 sales increased 3.8% vs 1Q13.