PCB Tech - Industrial Review and Prospect of my country's PCB Industry

The heavy content of the 2019 International Electronic Circuits (Shanghai) Exhibition-CPCA 2019 Spring International PCB Technology/Information Forum was grandly opened in the afternoon of March 19 at the National Convention and Exhibition Center (Shanghai). I hope that colleagues in the PCB industry will work together to grasp the development trend of the industry and create the next golden decade of industry development!

External cyclical changes have triggered structural changes in the industry. Only by seizing opportunities and practicing well can companies embark on the road of sustainable development.

Why start looking back ten years ago, because in 2008, the industry faced great challenges. This is due to the impact of the global financial crisis. Especially in the second half of the year, many companies have experienced a cliff-like decline in orders, and there have been many layoffs and panics. It can be said that in the past ten years we have walked through ups and downs like this. Similarly, the macro environment in 2018 has also experienced many challenges and uncertainties. So I want to start in 2008, review the path the industry has taken in the past ten years and look forward to how it should go in the future.

At that time, China was experiencing a financial crisis, and China's GDP was 31 trillion. By last year, GDP had exceeded 90 trillion. In 2008, our communication with the outside world was mainly through two channels. The telephone was through feature phones and the Internet was through the PC. The 2G network was the most used, and the 3G was the most talked about. In 18 years, the mobile smart terminal has done everything. Now, 4G is the most used, and 5G is the biggest hot spot. The whole world has undergone earth-shaking changes in the past ten years.

Looking back on the past, first look at the performance of the industry: PCB global output has exceeded US$40 billion in 2008 to more than US$60 billion in 2018. In terms of compound growth rate, it reached 2.6%, which is not a particularly high number in terms of numbers. But behind this, there are important adjustments. From a trend point of view, from 1988 to the present, the PCB industry has continued to maintain a growth trend. For the electronic information industry, it is commendable. The process was not all smooth sailing, but showed the characteristics of large-cycle growth and small-cycle fluctuations. And the rising cycle is shortening, from 10 years to 8 years, 6 years, and 5 years, which means that our industry is maturing in the process of growth. At the same time, it will be affected by external industries, and some changes will occur.

The global output of PCB went from more than US$40 billion in 2008 to more than US$60 billion in 2018.

It is the electronic information industry that promotes the development of the PCB industry. The 3C market is still the main force, but great structural changes have taken place: PCs have dropped significantly, and the demand for PCBs represented by mobile phones has increased significantly. The ups and downs have also brought about profound changes in the industry.

Industry concentration has further improved, and the proportion of TOP 10 companies in the world has reached 33%, an increase of 5.5 percentage points compared with 2008. It can be seen that in the process of industrial development, top enterprises have contributed the most.

Analyzing the TOP 10 companies in 2008 and 2018, we will find that great changes have taken place. There are 4 companies that have newly entered the world's top ten, and Zhending in particular has grown rapidly. In terms of scale, the threshold for the tenth place has increased by 200 million U.S. dollars in ten years, but the first place has increased by 1.9 billion U.S. dollars, and the gap is widening. The gap between NO.1 and NO.10 has widened from 2 times to 4 times, which is a big change. There are 10 new companies entering the TOP 40 camp, 5 of which are Chinese-funded companies.

Analyzing the TOP 10 companies in 2008 and 2018, we will find that great changes have taken place.

There are two main reasons for the changes. One is that the outside has grasped the pulse of industrial development, and the second is that the internal has carried out aggressive capacity expansion and rapid improvement of operations and technical capabilities. For example, Pengding focuses on the mobile phone market and becomes the world's largest PCB manufacturing company by focusing on the soft board; Dongshan Precision repairs both "soft and hard" through mergers and acquisitions; AT&S has its own characteristics in packaging substrates and HDI. ; Shennan has formed its own competitiveness in the field of communications and packaging substrates; Jingwang has formed an advantage in high efficiency and low cost. In other words, rapid development requires industrial stimulus and seize opportunities.