July 2025 Connector Industry News

Upcoming industry events, as well as recent award, partnership, promotion, personnel, facility, distribution, standards, association, and certification news from across the connector industry.

July 2025 Connector Industry News

July 2025 Connector Industry News > Event News

NEUTRIK recently celebrated the creation of its two-billionth connector with a reception at Neutrik Group headquarters in Schaan, Liechtenstein. The company’s guests included national and local government, media, and business partners. Welcoming speeches were given by Robert Büchel, Liechtenstein minister of economic affairs, and Marcus Beck, deputy mayor of Schaan. Also present was Manfred Kaufmann, president of the Liechtenstein Parliament.

July 2025 Connector Industry News > Award News

DigiKey received 16 awards from its supplier partners during the 2025 EDS Leadership Summit, held May 19-23, in Las Vegas. The company was recognized for its sales results, partnership, collaboration, and more during the past year from EDAC (Excellence in Marketing), Molex (2024 Americas E-Catalog Distributor of the Year; 2024 Global E-Catalog Distributor of the Year), and others. At its EDS Business Update Breakfast, attended by nearly 1,000 industry guests, Dave Doherty, president of DigiKey, and Mike Slater, vice president of global business development, discussed market activity, industry trends, and DigiKey’s strategic vision, including initiatives that involve AI to improve customer service and efficiency.

Frank Flynn, president, Bruce Kellar, senior VP of sales, Faris Aruri, senior VP of marketing, and David Smith, director, supplier marketing & product management for Sager recently presented awards to Brett Lyvers, director of distribution manager, Rick Skees, VP of sales distribution, and Tony Niemann, product marketing for Samtec.

Sager Electronics announced the top performers in its 2024 Supplier Excellence Program. The program focuses on quality, operations, and business systems support. For the fourth time in the program’s history, Samtec was honored with two awards – the Diamond Confidence Award for Overall Top Supplier Performance and the Best Quality Award. This marks the eighth time Samtec has been recognized since the program’s inception in 2014. In addition, Molex was honored for the first time in Sager’s Supplier Excellence Program. On the flipside, Sager was named one of OTTO Controls’ Platinum Distributors for 2024, the ninth consecutive year OTTO Controls has recognized Sager for its performance, and Bel Fuse recognized Sager Electronics as its Distributor of the Year for outstanding performance in sales growth, POS growth, customer expansion, and overall support and engagement.

TTI IP&E has received the TE Connectivity Global Broadline Distributor of the Year award for 2024 for a record-breaking twelfth time. John Drabik, Global President, TTI IP&E, said, “We’re honored to receive this award from TE Connectivity. It reflects the dedication and consistent performance of our global team, and the strength of our partnership with TE. At TTI, we believe performance matters — and this recognition reinforces our commitment to delivering excellence every day.”

July 2025 Connector Industry News > Personnel & Acquisitions News

Gia Hayes has been named vice president of sales, TTI IP&E, Americas. Hayes, who joined TTI in 2020 as vice president of the company’s aerospace and defense segment, brings decades of experience in the electronics industry to the role, and consistently demonstrated exceptional leadership and a deep commitment to the core values of TTI. Hayes will report directly to Geoff Imlach, president, TTI IP&E, Americas and will oversee sales initiatives, bringing her wealth of experience and innovative approach to lead the company’s sales teams toward continued success. Her commitment to building strong customer relationships and delivering value aligns perfectly with TTI’s mission to be the preferred distributor of electronic components.

Damon de Laszlo, Harwin’s president, has been made a CBE in this year’s King’s Birthday Honours list. Recognizing his outstanding achievements as an industrialist, scientific philanthropist, and patron of the arts, Damon has been awarded the CBE for “services to the manufacturing industry and scientific and charitable causes.” The de Laszlo family founded Harwin in 1952 and Damon has been instrumental in running and growing the company since the 1980s. As well as his current position as president of Harwin plc, Damon sits on the boards of many companies in Europe and the United States and is the chairman of the Economic Research Council (ERC), a UK-based organization dedicated to discussing and debating economic issues. Damon is also a trustee of The de Laszlo Foundation, a charitable trust that, since 1987, has focused on advancing and promoting education and research in art, science, medicine, and economics. “It is a fantastic surprise to be honored in such a way for things that one has always enjoyed doing, not least as it is rare for such awards to be given to industrialists,” said Lazslo. “Clearly, Harwin’s growth was one of the factors behind the decision, so I would like to recognize that the company’s success has been a true team effort, achieved in no small part by growing and nurturing employees through our commitment to internal development.”

Tom Liguori has joined the Waldom Electronics Board of Advisors. Throughout his distinguished career, Liguori has held CFO roles at Avnet, Advanced Energy, and Dole Foods, among others. His deep expertise spans investor relations, capital allocation, M&A, global equity markets, and corporate governance. He is also a board director at Master Electronics and a NACD board fellow since 2016.

Family-owned R&M appointed Dr. Roger Baumann as its new CEO. A team player with broad management experience, Baumann has decades of international management, technology, and sales experience in the manufacturing industry. He began his career in 1998 at Siemens AG, where he worked, among other things, as head of global business segments and as managing director of the market organization in Taiwan. From this position, he is familiar with the infrastructure solutions for building automation, such as those offered by R&M in the LAN division. Since 2009, Roger Baumann has been CEO and managing director of three medium-sized, globally active technology companies. He studied electrical engineering at ETH Zurich and completed his doctorate in microtechnology at EPFL Lausanne. He also completed the Executive MBA program as well as the Board Program at the University of St. Gallen. Michel Riva, CEO of R&M since 2012, has decided to scale back his professional activities and focus on consulting and advisory board mandates.

July 2025 Connector Industry News > Facility News

Weidmuller USA hosted a grand opening of the company’s new 24,000-square-foot engineering and production facility on June 11, 2025, as a highlight to the year-long celebration of Weidmuller’s milestone 50^th anniversary in Richmond. A tour of the new facility highlighted how distribution, assembly, and manufacturing will focus on advances Weidmuller has made in complex assembly solutions. Featured products included photovoltaic (PV) combiner boxes with real-time string monitoring for the solar industry and ready-to-install stainless steel enclosures for challenging or hazardous environments, along with other future-forward wireless solutions shaping the way to digitalization. The facility reduces the company’s carbon footprint through solar panels, high efficiency HVAC, and recycled materials. A native habitat garden accentuates the natural landscape beside the building and creates a relaxing and sustainable space for employees to enjoy. Additional celebrations include Weidmüller Group’s 50^th year of operation in Canada and its 175^th Anniversary globally.

July 2025 Connector Industry News > Partnership and Distribution News

As part of its commitment to supporting European space players, Nicomatic is collaborating with Latitude, a company specializing in the development of space launchers. This partnership focuses on the supply of onboard interconnect solutions for the Zephyr rocket. Latitude is developing a next-generation launcher designed to meet the growing demand for placing small satellites into orbit. Constraints in terms of space, weight, reliability, and resistance to extreme environments require high standards for onboard systems — especially interconnections. In this context, Nicomatic provides compact, rugged, and modular interconnect solutions tailored to Zephyr’s critical interfaces. The selected connectors are designed to withstand vibration, temperature fluctuations, signal integrity challenges, and tight space requirements, while complying with strict subsystem standards.

Sager Electronics announced the addition of the Advanced Energy’s TEGAM product brand to the Sager portfolio. TEGAM brand is recognized for its industry-leading metrology and calibration technologies.

Schaltbau supports Swissloop, a student-led pioneering organization dedicated to the development of hyperloop transportation technologies. With this sponsorship, Schaltbau underscores its commitment to next-generation mobility solutions and the development of vital innovative engineering talent. Swissloop is developing cutting-edge prototypes, called “pods,” that are designed to revolutionize transportation with speeds faster than airplanes and efficiency surpassing conventional rail. The partnership will support Swissloop students in the design, manufacture, and rigorous testing of their hyperloop pod, enhancing their skills in printed circuit board design, CAD modeling, structural analysis, electromagnetics, and more. Swissloop will showcase its latest innovations at European Hyperloop Week from July 14-20, 2025, an competition where teams from all over the world compete, collaborate, and share knowledge. Schaltbau’s sponsorship underscores its leadership in sustainable and advanced transportation solutions, playing a vital role in driving forward the transformative vision of hyperloop technology.

July 2025 Connector Industry News > New Technical Resources

DigiKey now offers a free, on-demand Zephyr online workshop and video series on writing device drivers. Zephyr, a powerful real-time operating system (RTOS) and development framework with a steep learning curve, is a key system for engineers and students to learn. The online workshop, led by Shawn Hymel, an expert instructor and course creator in embedded systems and machine learning, guides engineers and students through the process of writing an I²C temperature sensor device driver for Zephyr. Device drivers are one of the fundamental building blocks of Zephyr, and by creating one, attendees will gain experience working with C code, CMake, Kconfig, and Devicetree systems. Understanding these languages and systems is crucial for developing applications in Zephyr. The workshop is available on-demand, and the educational video series is available on YouTube.

Nicomatic is launching a comprehensive portfolio of technical and organizational services designed to support customers in their challenges related to qualification, industrialization, integration, and managerial transformation. The company now offers several specialized service streams: technical training; optical fiber training; engineering; laboratory expertise; consulting to support implementing, improving, and auditing quality systems; leadership practices; and digitalization and AI. This holistic approach allows Nicomatic to develop sustainable solutions with its customers, combining technical expertise, standards compliance, and human-focused support.

July 2025 Connector Industry News > Association, Standards, & Certifications News

Alain Hunkins will be the closing keynote speaker for day two of ECIA’s Executive Conference. Hunkins is a Forbes contributor, leadership strategist, and author of Cracking the Leadership Code: Three Secrets to Building Strong Leaders. He has worked with more than 3,000 teams and leaders at organizations like Walmart, Pfizer, Citigroup, GE, and Microsoft, helping them improve performance, communication, and collaboration. Blending behavioral science, real-world storytelling, and actionable tools, Hunkins equips leaders to drive meaningful change that lasts. ECIA’s Executive Conference is specifically tailored for senior management and executives in the industry’s leading companies. The 2025 Executive Conference will be held October 19-21 at a new location, the Westin O’Hare Hotel. Alain Hunkins’ keynote sponsorship is available.

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