Components: Lead times increase

Since mid-2009, many suppliers have immense problems with production and delivery of components, affected the entire industry. As fast as order numbers went down in late 2008, as fast they increased again after the recession. However, many component suppliers reduced production capacity and inventory to the lowest level possible in an effort to safe costs. “The result is now evident in very long lead times (for some components as high as 60 weeks) or the allocation of certain components. This in return means for many EMS-providers that the flow of production material is rather slow and increasingly unreliable. Here are some examples: • SRAM slow (such as Renesas, NEC, Cypress) – between 8 and 16 weeks (possible increase) • Flash NAND (e.g. Micron, Samsung, Numonyx) – between 8 and 16 weeks; some with allocation (possible increase in lead times) • Discrete Components (such as ON Semi, Vishay, ST Micro) – between 12 and 26 weeks (increase in lead times very likely) • USB, UART (e.g. National Semi, NXP, Texas Instruments) - between 4 and 20 weeks • Passive Components – the highest lead times of all component categories - Capacitors (e.g. Panasonic, Kemet Arc, Murata) – currently between 12 and 42 weeks (some products come with lead times as high as 60 weeks) • Connectors – varies greatly depending on type - RF Connectors (e.g. Amphenol, Molex, Tyco) – between 8 and 16 weeks • Solid state relais (e.g. Fujitsu, Omron, Tyco) – between 4 and 22 weeks (some lead times move up to 30 or 40 weeks)