SINGAPORE – Singapore's exports to the US fell 44.4% year-over-year in February, pulling the nation's shipments down 24%.
Weak demand for electronics was among the reasons cited for the drop. Electronics exports dropped 31.9% to S$3.5 billion.
Shipments to the country's 10 top trading partners were down, except China. Sales to US customers dropped to US$673 million, but the percentage drop actually climbed slightly from a 50% plunge in January. Shipments to the European Union fell 36.7%, and sales to Japan dropped 38.9%.
HELSINKI – Nokia said it would cut up to 1,700 jobs, or about 1.3% of the company’s work force, in response to sluggish demand and the poor outlook for near-term recovery.
The company said the cuts will come in its device and media segments, plus corporate development and global support.
Cellphone sales were down 5% to 315 million cellphones in the fourth quarter, Gartner reported, and grew 2% sequentially despite the holiday buying season.
NEW YORK -- DuPontexpects to nearly triple its annual photovoltaic sales to more than $1 billion in the next three years in part by delivering new technologies to the solar industry. The overall solar market size today is estimated to be $30 billion, and according to industry estimates, will increase to $70 billion by 2013.
“Through investments in materials, technology development and manufacturing, DuPont is accelerating its ability to deliver innovations that will improve the lifetime and efficiency of photovoltaic modules,” Dave Miller, group vice president, DuPont Electronic and Communication Technologies, said.
The company is channeling research and development resources into products for module manufacturing that include polyvinyl fluoride (PVF) films and thick film metallization pastes. Additional research is directed towards the thin film photovoltaic energy market where the projected growth rate is expected to be higher than that for crystalline silicon modules.
NEW YORK -- Is Big Blue seeking Sun? According to several reports today, IBM is in negotiations to buy Sun Microsystems for a sum that could exceed $6.5 billion.
Reuters, The Wall Street Journal and others are reporting Sun has been looking to be acquired but such a move would require unbundling many of the company's software, hardware and services offerings. The Journal said HP turned down a possible deal for Sun.
A wild card is Cisco, which recently announced plans to enter the data storage market and which has a history of buying and integrating large OEMs such as Scientific-Atlanta, ArrowPoint and WebEx.
The deal, if closed, would be IBM's largest acquisition, and would consolidate the server market. IBM had a 36.3% share in the fourth quarter, while Sun was fourth at 9.3%, according to research firm IDC.HP's share was 29%, Dell's was 10.6% and Fujitsu's was 4.2%.
Neither company is commenting on the rumor.
An EMS industry analyst said Benchmark is the most highly exposed EMS company to a merger. A merger would mean the firm would generate an estimated 25% of its revenue from IBM-Sun, Sherri Scribner of Deutsche Bank Equity Research wrote in a research note today. Celestica would have 15 to 20% of revenue coming from the combined company, and Sanmina-SCI and Flextronics would have 10 to 15%.
"If IBM and Sun were to combine, we would expect a limited impact to our EMS group in the short-term, as both companies heavily rely on outsourcing and options for top-tier EMS suppliers are limited," Scriber wrote. "In addition, enterprise customers are slow to shift away from entrenched hardware, and we would expect IBM to continue to support Sun platforms over the next few years. Over the longer term, we would expect enterprise customers to shift to either IBM or HP platforms. We expect this to be a modest negative to Benchmark, which has high exposure to Sun and limited exposure to HP."
EL SEGUNDO, CA — Pricing for commodity electronics components is falling at a moderate rate, but the pace of erosion reflects the fact that pricing has already hit rock bottom in many commodity categories, according to iSuppli Corp.
MUNICH--There are no signs that the PCB market in Germany is improving, according to the German Printed Circuit Association (VdL) and the German Electrical and Electronic Manufacturers Association (ZVEI).
