Volume increases and continued vitality in Asia will enable the electronic components market to weather the stormy 2008 economy, said analysts at CARTS USA 2008, the 28th annual conference and exposition held last week in Newport Beach, Calif.  The event is sponsored by the Electronic Components Association (ECA).

Sigh of Relief

The conference kicked off with market analysts providing a sigh of relief for attendees.  Dennis Zogbi, president of the analyst firm Paumanok Publications, predicted 2008 growth rates of around six percent for the electronic components industry.  In Zogbi’s view, increases in the number of components in today’s products will offset any decreases in end-user sales.  Zogbi’s prognosis was echoed by Eric Pratt, senior director at iSuppli, whose product tear-downs illustrated the increasing number of passive components in the most popular electronic products.

Bob Willis, ECA president, also struck a note of conservative optimism.  He said electronic components growth had flattened in the first quarter of this year according to his association’s monthly order report index, but was capable of repeating last year’s moderate growth of around five percent.

20 percent a slowdown?

While Western economies struggle with market woes, China is undergoing its version of a slowdown: Amy Wang, vice president of China Outlook Consulting, said that the Chinese economy is decelerating, which in this case means growth of 20 percent annually.

Going green not an option

John Maxwell, vice president of engineering at Johanson Dielectrics, presented the keynote at this year’s conference, titled “The Perils of Passives Going Green.” Maxwell is this year’s recipient of the Dr. Felix Zandman Award, recognizing individuals who have made outstanding technical contributions to the electronic components industry.  Zandman is the chairman and founder of Vishay Intertechnology.

Maxwell said that environmental requirements are here to stay and will become more onerous to manufacturers in the near future.  He ended with a warning to manufacturers that being “exempt” from environmental regulations will no longer be an option.

Best of the best

CARTS is known best for its technical program and this year’s showed the application diversity that characterizes the electronic components industry.  More than 35 papers featured insights into topics such as MEMS, medical advances, future processor requirements, and harsh environments in automotive, space and military applications.

Following a long-standing tradition at CARTS, awards were presented for the best papers from the previous year’s conference.   A team of engineers from KEMET won the 2007 Best Paper Award for an effort titled “Thin Film MLCC,” and a team from Vishay Vitramon won the 2007 Outstanding Paper Award for “Voltage Breakdowns in Mechanisms in High Voltage Rated Surface Mount MLCCs.”