Few things in the connector industry go back 60 years. The unique collaboration between Avnet and Amphenol is one of them. Radio. That’s where it all began for two of the connector industry’s leading players. Amphenol, an early manufacturer of radio components, was innovating within that industry when a parts distributor named Charles Avnet tookRead More

Smaller connector designs pushed by the cellphone world find a new home in portable and scaled-down gaming devices. Gaming Connectors Evolve For decades, young people have had their first exposure to connectors through gaming equipment. Although the vast array of electronics contained in these systems are hidden within the consoles and peripherals, perhaps no otherRead More

The top 10 connector manufacturers, as a group, achieved $32 billion in annual sales in 2016, or 59.8% of world connector demand. The following table identifies the top 10 as defined by total world connector sales. Table 1 (above) reveals some interesting trends: The top four connector manufacturers are all US-based companies: TE Connectivity #1,Read More

We track the top companies over the decades. This year’s ranking uncovers some new players — and some that we’ve known for along time. Since 1980, there has been a dramatic change in the companies that comprise the top 10. Some companies have moved up in rank, others have moved out of the top 10,Read More

This week’s product roundup highlights some of the most rugged and reliable power connectors available on today’s market. Power Connector Roundup Nicomatic’s CMM Micro lightweight, rectangular connectors are designed to meet or exceed the electrical and mechanical performance requirements for the MIL-DTL-55302F and BS-9525-F0033 standards, and allow for more than 20 million arrangements of high-power,Read More

This week’s product roundup highlights some of the latest and greatest connector and cabling solutions for in-flight service applications. In-Flight Service When installed between the unit under test and test equipment, ITT Cannon’s Tight-Tolerance 38999-Style Series III Fiber Optic Connector Savers reinforce the integrity and extend the life of these connectors, contacts, and cable assemblies,Read More

Very early computers were a mass of discrete point-to-point wires. The combination of physics and economics is bringing that interconnect architecture back full circle. Design engineers have been grappling for years with the challenge of propagating ever-increasing signal rates in printed circuit boards. As data rates pushed into RF regions, signal modeling transitioned from simpleRead More

Driverless cars will be expected to transmit and receive tremendous amounts of data. How will connectors address data speeds and data management in the driverless car? Perhaps you’ve heard the expression that our cars are an extension of ourselves. But as automotive technology marches on, the industry is looking forward to the day when aRead More

GM is investing $1 billion in US factories, possibly foretelling a strong market for industrial products. Record setting robot sales also portend growth for connector makers that focus on the severe demands for ruggedized components.   A General Motors plan to invest $1 billion in its US factories may herald an expansion in manufacturing. TheRead More

Don’t miss any of the latest product launches and technology highlights at this year’s electronica: Let our electronica 2016 short list be your guide.   Then, check back with us on December 6 after the show to see a more thorough list of new connector products introduced at the show. We’ll continue to bring you coverage ofRead More

We reached out to top RF/microwave suppliers to find out about their latest and greatest product launches for this microwave product roundup.   Molex’s new Temp-Flex Foam-Core Ultra-Low-Loss Coaxial Microwave Cable combines space savings with an effective dielectric that eliminates “phase knee” and provides ease of termination. It also achieves 80% velocity of propagation (VOP) lossRead More

Increasing demands of growing data volumes force IT professionals to explore better connection options.   Ask five people to define “Big Data” and you are likely to get five different definitions – ranging from broad references about analyzing numerous data sets for patterns and trends, down to very precise specifications for data set size orRead More