At National Electronics Week (NEW) Karen Moore-Watts, Global Marcom Director, DEK International, spoke to EPP Europe about current trends in the industry.
What trends do you see, if you look at recent trade shows in Europe such as Productronica, SMT, NEW?
In my opinion, the shows started a little quieter than in previous years, but this may be as a result of the slow down in the market. Looking from DEK’s standpoint, much of the high-volume manufacturing takes place in China while, within Europe, we still see plenty of medium volume and high mix manufacturing but also a great deal of development going on. These development initiatives continue to drive the European market and many of the products in design use high value subassemblies that demand leading-edge assembly processes, which is where DEK can deliver the difference. As far as the European electronics production sector is concerned, our presence at European shows has proved through the visitor profile that there is a growing base of manufacturing in Russia, Ukraine and the more eastern countries in the region.
Where do you see the reasons for not having so much traffic this year?
I think it is issues like some overcapacity within the assembly sector, as well as factors that impact businesses and individuals more directly like the credit crunch, the economic turndown and fuel crisis that play a part. In addition, there are emerging and buoyant sectors that overlap the electronics industry, notably in photovoltaic processing, that are attracting new interest and add to the schedule of shows already in place. People can only visit so many events in a year.
Do you think manufacturing will come back from China to Europe?
I don’t know that it ever totally left Europe. Again, if you look at territories within Eastern Europe, it is becoming the target market in the continent. We already have dominant market share in the traditional markets of Western European, and have maintained our growth markets within Central Europe. So these Eastern regions represent a large growth area for us.
Is your company also active in Eastern Europe?
Yes, we have full service and sales facilities headquartered in Gyor in Hungary specifically to serve the Central and Eastern European territories directly.
Do you also manufacture there?
Yes, we have fast-turnround stencil & screen production facilities. As far as equipment manufacturing is concerned, we have two manufacturing sites, one in Shenzhen, Southern China, and one in Weymouth, England. These are supported by 17 manufacturing sites for stencils worldwide, one of which is in Hungary.
What are your European customers’ biggest challenges and opportunities for the coming years?
Everything for our customers today is about productivity and miniaturisation, and about design and distribution. To get the most out of what they have – from factory real-estate to the functionality of a product – customers need more than excellent production equipment. They need knowledge too – especially in the form of process expertise. Customers’ demands have a much greater and more immediate impact on us. Similarly, what happens in the High Street affects us more than it has ever done. Consumers drive the constant demand for much smaller but ever more functional products – and at a low cost. DEK’s expertise in enabling assembly customers to achieve greater levels of efficiency pays off directly in better productivity at higher and more consistent product quality. It’s this that allows them to stay competitive. (jau)
EPP Europe 413
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