News
The National Electronics Manufacturing Initiative (NEMI, Herndon, VA) is hosting an open workshop to review year-to-date progress on the 2004 NEMI Roadmap. The meeting is scheduled for June 23 at NEMI headquarters.
"This workshop serves as an important reality check for the teams writing the various roadmap chapters and helps us enhance the quality of the final product," said Jim Arnold, director of roadmapping for NEMI and a fellow of the Motorola technical staff. "It also gives the industry a sneak peak at what will be featured in the final roadmap. This year, we are actively soliciting global participation in this review as we begin the first steps toward internationalizing the NEMI roadmap. For example, we have already secured commitments from the Components, Packaging and Manufacturing Technology Society (CPMT) of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE/CPMT) and IMAPS Europe to participate. In addition, we have had positive interactions with Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association (JEITA), and representatives from Japan will be involved in the 2004 roadmap."
Every two years, NEMI maps the future manufacturing needs of the global electronics industry to identify the key technology and infrastructure developments required to assure leadership of the supply chain over the next decade. It helps companies anticipate shifts in product requirements and provides an early warning of changes in technology or infrastructure. It also serves as the foundation of all of the consortium's activities.
The 2004 roadmap marks the tenth anniversary of this initiative. The first roadmap was created in 1994 by the National Electronics Manufacturing Framework Committee, a group of 200 individuals from industry, government and academia who came together to study the challenges facing the nation in electronics manufacturing and to develop technology roadmaps and policy options with which to address these challenges. To celebrate this milestone, NEMI is planning a banquet on the evening of June 22 at the consortium's headquarters. The event will feature speakers from industry and government and provide an opportunity for the group to meet informally prior to the workshop sessions the next day.
The workshop registration fee is $200 for non-members and $100 for members, and includes attendance at the banquet, participation in the workshop (including lunch and breaks), a CD of workshop presentations and the 2004 NEMI Roadmap CD when published.
For more information, visit: www.nemi.org/roadmapping/june_TWG.html.
Copyright 2004, UP Media Group. All rights reserved.
Cookson Group plc
(London, UK) announced that Stephen Howard intends to relinquish his
role as group chief executive after the identification and appointment
of a successor. The process of identifying a successor has commenced
and the Board hopes that an appointment will be made during 2004.
Accordingly, it is expected that Howard will leave the company on or
before Dec. 31, 2004.
Howard has been a
director of Cookson since 1992 and in his current position since 1997.
During the seven years of his tenure as group chief executive, Cookson
has been fundamentally reshaped into a highly focused group, centered
around electronics and ceramics, with the precious metals division the
subject of an ongoing strategic review, as announced on March 15, 2004.
Stephen
Howard said, "My eighteen years at Cookson have been enormously
fulfilling, but the time has simply come to do something else. The
company is now in excellent competitive shape and the long-awaited
recovery is clearly underway, making this year the appropriate time to
pass the baton on."
Bob Beeston, chairman of Cookson, said, "The
Board is very grateful for Stephen Howard's contribution to, and
leadership of, the company over many years. After three years of very
difficult trading conditions, Cookson is now firmly on the recovery
path, is in a sound financial position and is therefore very well
positioned to prosper under his successor."
An announcement concerning a successor will be made at the appropriate time.
At Nepcon Shanghai 2004, Cor Scholten, Assembléon's (Eindhoven, The
Netherlands) chief executive officer, confirmed that Asia, and in particular, China, is a key element of the company's long-term global business strategy.
In 2003, sales in Asia grew to 40% of the company's total sales, up from just over 30% in 2002, with China representing 30% of this growth. As a direct result of the company's aggressive drive to increase market share in this market, Assembléon expects China to represent 70% of total Asia sales in 2004.
"We recognized China as a growing force in the global market several years ago and moved quickly to position ourselves to serve not only the large multinational original design manufacturers (ODMs) and electronics manufacturing service (EMS) companies that were moving their operations into China, but also the large number of local Chinese enterprises that were becoming increasingly sophisticated and challenging the foreign-owned multinationals," said Scholten.
"Unlike many other vendors, Assembléon does not view China simply as a location for low-cost manufacturing," Scholten continued. "Instead, we firmly believe that China is one of the key market and technology drivers in the world. No longer is China just looking at its export markets, but domestic sales are booming and helping to drive new technology around the world. Also, many of the domestic brands, such as Bird, Eastcom, and TCL, are outselling multinational brands by swiftly incorporating new functionality as soon as it becomes available."
In addition to its distribution policy, Assembléon has continued its own direct commitment to China, and expects to more than quadruple its staff headcount by the end of 2004. The additional staff will be deployed in the new locations around the country and in a new training and demonstration center expected to open in Shanghai before the end of the year.
Assembléon's drive to increase market share and sales in 2004 is focused upon a number of industry segments: consumer electronics—including PC motherboards, mobile phones, LCD monitors and DVD/EVD players; telecommunications equipment, including PBXs and trunking systems; and the automotive electronics and GPS segments.
Copyright 2004, UP Media Group. All rights reserved.
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