Distribution

Distributors traditionally feel much of the pain in a market downturn. So when they start to see sales figures turning around then it is a safe bet that the market is moving into more positive territory

"Group sales and underlying group operating profit both returned to year on year growth during the fourth quarter,” said Harriet Green, Premier Farnell’s group chief executive

“We are operating in very unusual market conditions in what continues to be a fragile overall economic environment, exacerbated by uncertainty about the forthcoming general election in the UK,” said Adam Fletcher of Afdec

Last year, EPC introduced its first commercial enhancement-mode GaN transistors. The supplier claims these can have “characteristics similar to silicon power mosfets”

“The agreement with Energy Micro is not only strengthening our (32-bit) microcontroller portfolio, but also fits perfectly into our technology strategy,” said Jon Ellis, v-p technical marketing at Avnet Memec

Sequoia Technology has signed ZigBee module manufacturer Telegesis, which makes 2.4GHz ZigBee modules for mesh networking up to 600 nodes

A survey by Electronics Weekly of 20 managers in the distribution sector recorded an almost universal increase in confidence and new ordering levels as the economy emerges from recession

“If we do not double the UK business in the next two years I will be disappointed. There is an incredible opportunity to grow the business here,” Mark Larson tells Electronics Weekly

"I am pleased to report that January has seen an underlying improvement with Group sales growing by around 10% and International delivering sales growth of around 12%,” said Ian Mason, group chief executive

Large scale projects in the enterprise arena continue to face delays but momentum is building in the worldwide IT components market according to Arrow Electronics.