$36 Billion Connection

Electronic News, April 17, 2000 by Ken Fleck

How big is the entire connector market? More than $36 billion. The traditional market is defined as connectors, cable assemblies, backplanes, and interconnect devices, with the latter counting intelligent connectors and PC cards. Total worldwide shipments in 1999 were $36.056 billion, an increase of 9.1 percent over the prior yearas $33.051 billion. Of this $36.1 billion, $23.3 billion were connectors, $14.1 billion were cable assemblies, $2.1 billion were backplanes, and $1.1 billion were interconnect devices. Connectors are incorporated within cable assemblies and backplanes, creating a double counting of about $4.6 billion. Connectors increased 8.6 percent in 1999, cable assemblies 8 percent, backplanes 19.9 percent, and interconnect devices 15.5 percent. There were 51 manufacturers on a worldwide basis who shipped $100 million or over, recording $21.162 billion or 59 percent of the world total.

The top 10 accounted for $12.720 billion or 35 percent. Their ranking and market share are: (1) Tyco 12.2 percent, (2) FCI 5.2 percent, (3) Molex 5.1 percent, (4) Amphenol 2.2 percent, (5) Hon Hai 2.1 percent, (6) JST 2.1 percent, (7) Hirose 1.9 percent, (8) 3M 1.5 percent, (9) JAE 1.5 percent, and (10) Thomas & Betts 1.5 percent.

With the connector industry expanding vertically, there were an additional $2.6 billion box-build and electronic subassemblies, $565 million fiber optic shelves/racks, and $1.2 billion of copper-based shelves/racks a a total $4.3 billion additional worldwide shipments in 1999. Box-build and electronic assemblies increased 35.1 percent last year. Box-build is defined as the complete box a card cage, card guides, power supply, backplane, daughtercards, and the interconnection of same. Companies involved include Teradyne, Sanmina, Viasystems, Hon Hai, Hadco, C-MAC, and Tyco.

In fiber optic shelves and racks in 1999, shipments were up 29.2 percent. Leading suppliers include Lucent, Telect, ADC, Tyco, 3M, Molex, Sanwa, Sumitomo, Amphenol, Fujikura, Hon Hai, Thomas & Betts, Seiko, and Gore. In copper-based shelves and racks the leaders include ADC, Lucent, Gore, Hon Hai, and others. When connectors, cable assemblies, backplanes, interconnect devices, box- builds, electronic subassemblies, fiber, and copper shelves/racks are combined, the total worldwide shipments accounted for $40.403 billion in 1999, up 10.8 percent over 1998. The top 10 worldwide leaders are: (1) Tyco at 11.0 percent, (2) FCI at 4.8 percent, (3) Molex at 4.7 percent, (4) Hon Hai at 2.4 percent (5) Amphenol at 2.0 percent, (6) JST at 1.8 percent, (7) Hirose at 1.7 percent, (8) Sanmina at 1.7 percent, (9) 3M at 1.4 percent and (10) Thomas & Betts at 1.4 percent. They recorded $13.242 billion, or 27 percent of the world number.

The second tier is: (11) JAE at 1.3 percent, (12) Honda at 1.2 percent (13) ITT Cannon at 1.1 percent (14) ADC at 1.0 percent (15) Teradyne at 1.0 percent (16) Furukawa at 0.9 percent (17) Lucent at 0.8 percent (18) Fujikura at 0.8 percent (19) Volex at 0.8 percent (20) Labinal at 0.8 percent. They recorded $3.967 billion, or 10 percent of the world.

Fleck Research can be contacted at (714) 953-9000 or at fleckresearch.com Web site.