> ERA Quick Connections – Nov. 2024, Vol. 2
November 2024, Volume 2
MONTHLY POS REPORTS
September 2024 shows basically no change relative to last month’s POS activity. September 2024 is down more than 6% versus September 2023. The last six months show no significant change month over month. However, we are charting a little more than a 4% drop from last year. Overall, POS activity is basically flat for the year, with no significant gains or losses at this time. Election years are often volatile but 2024 POS activity is remarkably consistent.
Now that the election is behind us, it will be interesting to see what impact it will have on our industry. We probably won’t see much in the next two months, but 2025 looks to probably be impacted significantly.
See the full POS report from BuddeMarketing.com.
INDUSTRY NEWS
> This week, the Biden administration announced a $6.6 billion award to TSMC for the construction of three fabrication plants in Arizona. TSMC’s plants in Arizona represent the biggest such foreign investment in U.S. history. Read more.
> The Biden administration also announced this week that Durham, N.C., will be the location for the new CHIPS Manufacturing USA Institute, a federal program to speed up development and reduce manufacturing costs for semiconductor technology. Read more.
> Chinese manufacturers are using Mexico as a backdoor to the U.S., reports the BBC. Read more.
INDUSTRY TRENDS SURVEY
The November ERA Electronics Components Industry Trends survey is now closed.
Please note: ERA sends this survey monthly to one contact from each ERA member firm via email. Please be on the lookout for this survey in your email inbox. Help us make this survey a valuable resource for you and the rest of our members by taking 5 minutes to complete this each month. The results are visible only to ERA members and gives us a great cross-section of what our members see on the horizon for the near and long term.
VIEW SURVEY RESULTS
ERA NEWS
> ERA is thrilled to announce Nikolas Badminton, futurist speaker and best-selling author, and Melissa Dailey Fairbanks, financial analyst in the semiconductor and IT supply chain sectors, as General Session speakers at the 2025 ERA Conference in February! Read the full press release. Register for the Conference before it sells out!
> The ERA Mark Motsinger White Pin Internship program is now accepting applications for 2025! This internship program offers a manufacturers’ rep (who is an ERA member) a chance to hire a college student as an intern, with ERA and the White Pin group subsidizing a substantial portion of the anticipated internship cost. ERA aims to give out FIVE monetary awards in 2025. Deadline to apply is January 31, 2025 and awarded rep firms will be announced mid-February! Read more and apply.
> ERA offers a few benefits to its members you may not know about, including a bulletin board for open job positions and acquisitions and mergers; an industry dictionary of acronyms, abbreviations and terminology; sales training video archives for purchase; industry survey results; and a white paper library! Take advantage today.
The Electronics Representatives Association (ERA) announces that Erik Qualman, top technology speaker, #1 best-selling author and futurist, will be the keynote speaker at the 2025 ERA Conference, taking place Feb. 23-25, 2025, in Austin, Texas.
> ERA proudly introduces 
> There is still time to register for ERA’s annual 
> Don’t forget to secure your spot at the 2025 
> ERA 
> ERA is now accepting reservations for ad space in the Fall 2024 issue of 
Automation is at the heart of modern industries and is driving forward the digital transformation in almost all sectors. 
— Kate Van Hise has joined ERA as Events Manager to replace Erin Collins who recently left ERA. Kate resides in Rockford, Ill., and is a graduate of Illinois State University. Kate joins us with superb experience in managing different types of events and conferences, facilitating sales training and listening skills courses. Kate will be managing the 2025 ERA Conference in February 2025.
— Natalie Zullo has joined ERA as Operations Specialist, a new position for ERA. Natalie is a graduate of East Carolina University and resides in Greenville, N.C. She comes to ERA from the healthcare industry with a specialty in family and community services and child development. Natalie will be involved in many different areas of ERA, supporting the team with her strong operational and organization skills.
— Ama Derringer, Membership Services Coordinator, will be taking on the role of ERA Chapter support and supporting the efforts of the various ERA chapters. She will be partnering with Cam English to facilitate COLT training on October 6-8. She will also represent ERA at electronica in Munich, Germany on November 11-14.
Thank you,
> The entire detailed list of training sessions for 
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> Reminder: Secure your spot at ERA 
> The Summer issue of The Representor is now online and in mailboxes! Read the 
> Save the date for Feb. 23-25, 2025! The annual 
> What does recovery look like?
FROM THE TOP
What does recovery look like?
by John O’Brien, CPMR
ERA Chairman of the Board
How many of us are asked in meetings, “What do you see for recovery of the electronics industry?” Let’s face it, everyone is skeptical about when a recovery will occur, most people not venturing out more than two quarters to look for the growth we all know will return. Our industry is so cyclical that we often go through great periods of growth followed by short periods on flat or contraction. For those who have been around awhile, we can look back at the dotcom bust or the allocation periods, for example.
What I believe we are experiencing this time around are multiple forces driving our industry, but not always in the same direction. Going back to 2019/2020 and the COVID-19 era, expectations when COVID-19 first hit and everything shut down were that our industry would face a big downturn. I remember a meeting in March 2020 when we discussed how we would adjust to an anticipated drop in sales and revenue. As our people moved to work-from-home, it drove a surge in the very products we supply to support his new work model. As concerns arose over testing and treatments, our medical markets began to thrive.
Then 2021/2022 hit and the disruption in supply chain started to take hold. Customers bought usages going out a year so they could try to maintain their production. Then when they couldn’t get parts, they opened up their BOMs to cover build demands.
2023 rolled around and everyone was sitting on too much inventory. Everywhere throughout the supply chain, distributors, CEMs and OEMs all had raw materials inventory and in many cases, finished goods, that outpaced the end customer demand. So, throughout 2024, we’ve been tracking inventory work-downs. We’ve been watching end customer shipments but up until recently, design efforts were limited to sustaining engineering. Recently, we’ve started to see an increase in new product designs. These new designs are definitely taking longer and there are fewer going on at the same time.
So do these factors signal a recovery? I’ll get back to my original premise, “How do we define recovery?” If we look at recovery as a return to sales numbers equal or greater to the heights we’ve seen (for us that was 2022), then I believe we are still a ways out from there. Price pressures from the OEMs are causing lower overall sales, but, with similar volumes we’ve seen prior. Most recently, I’ve spoken to a number of folks at principals, distributors and CEMs and many are looking at 2019/2020 as a comparative time frame to 2024 and beyond. Everything I outlined previously in the article “artificially” inflated our numbers, so a comparison to a more stable time may help provide greater insight into what’s happening.
No matter how you define recovery, we all learned a valuable lesson over the past four years. We are a resilient industry that touches so many markets that help offset downturns. We are also an adaptive industry that sees these changes and can react quickly. Working together as reps, manufacturers and distributors, we will recover and be stronger than before.