"The best news from our January PCB surveys is the huge growth in orders compared to January of last year," said IPC President Denny McGuirk. "The book-to-bill ratio for all PCBs has stayed above 1.0 for nine months now, indicating continued sales growth in 2010," McGuirk concluded.

Rigid PCB shipments are down 2.0 percent while bookings increased 19.8 percent in January 2010 from January 2009. The book-to-bill ratio for the North American rigid PCB industry in January 2010 remained strong at 1.06.

Flexible circuit shipments in January 2010 were down 4.1 percent but bookings were up 59.3 percent compared to January 2009. The North American flexible circuit book-to-bill ratio climbed above parity to 1.03.

For rigid PCBs and flexible circuits combined, industry shipments in January 2010 decreased 2.1 percent from January 2009, as orders booked increased 22.2 percent from January 2009. The combined (rigid and flex) industry book-to-bill ratio in January 2010 held steady at 1.0.

The book-to-bill ratios are calculated by dividing the value of orders booked over the past three months by the value of sales billed during the same period from companies in IPC’s survey sample. A ratio of more than 1.00 suggests that current demand is ahead of supply, which is a positive indicator for sales growth over the next two to three months.

Book-to-bill ratios and growth rates for rigid PCBs and flexible circuits combined are heavily affected by the rigid PCB segment. Rigid PCBs represent an estimated 90 percent of the current PCB industry in North America, according to IPC’s World PCB Production and Laminate Market Report.