【Summary description】 For every connector enterprise, it is the best strategy to strive to be the largest company in the connector industry. The connector industry includes multinational connector manufacturers that provide products and services for multinational brand groups or OEM factories, and small-scale husband and wife shops that provide special products for small local enterprises.

For every connector enterprise, it is the best strategy to strive to be the largest company in the connector industry. The connector industry includes multinational connector manufacturers that provide products and services for multinational brand groups or OEM factories, and small-scale husband and wife shops that provide special products for small local enterprises. In the connector industry, several large multinational companies (including Tyco Electronics / TE, Amphenol / amphone, Morse / Molex) dominate the connector industry. According to authoritative data, the top ten connector manufacturers accounted for 54% of the global connector Market in 2009.

These large-scale connector enterprises design and produce a wide range of connectors all over the world, providing products and services for domestic and foreign customers. Their product catalog lists hundreds of types and thousands of connectors, from standard products to high-performance connectors, including copper connectors and optical fiber connectors. These large enterprises are often divided into business divisions, which focus on different connector market areas, such as automobile market, military industry market, industrial market, communication market, medical market, consumer electronics market, etc. They can also develop unique connector products for various fields. Their size and resources allow them to provide common connectors and sophisticated connectors. Their marketing staff provide customer support services to help customers choose the right connector when building a long-term relationship. Multinational brand group or OEM often regard these big companies as one-stop service providers, they can provide effective solutions to reduce the number of suppliers. The ability to provide local technical support and advanced technology often gives them the opportunity to see new products from customers first. The channel with technical requirements for early contact with customers' new generation products provides key connector development direction for these connector industry giants, so as to ensure that the new connector products developed by them can meet the new market demand. These connector industry leaders can not only continuously expand their market share, but also expand their market advantages through mergers and acquisitions.

The manufacturers of the second group of connectors offer a slightly limited variety of connectors, including industrial standard connectors, as well as connector designs with intellectual property rights for special occasions and even individual customers. Connector manufacturers at this level should be competitive in terms of price, quality, product line depth and customer service in the common connector field, because large connector manufacturers with overseas production capacity have formed price restrictions on such connectors, but they have much higher profits for connectors in specific markets or specific purposes. Small scale customers think that connector factories at this level have formed price restrictions Business people care more about them and provide better service. The group's connector companies include conec, Elco, Erni, HARTING, JST, samtc and Yamaichi. Connector enterprises at this level also include the branches of larger enterprises in the connector field, such as 3M's interconnect solutions division and ITT cannon's connection solutions division. The trend of industrial integration in the past decade has also appeared in the first and second groups of connector industry.

The third group army of connector chooses to develop niche market of connector At present, transliteration + free translation is more popular, so "niche market" is used here. Connector niche market refers to some market segments ignored by the first group of connector enterprises. The product market is not large, but the regional market is very large. The connector manufacturers of the third group can concentrate all their resources to develop it, form a winning force locally, and occupy a broad regional market with smaller niche products.

Other features of the connector niche market are:

1. It has the potential of sustainable development. After entering the market, connector enterprises can establish a great barrier, so that other competitors can not easily copy or replace (such as through targeted technology research and development and patents), guide the demand of target customers, lead the market trend, consolidate the leading position of enterprises in the market, and further expand the market demand.
2. The market is too small and the difference is large, so that the first group of connectors despises the market. Since it is despised and ignored, it is also a weak link. The smaller connector manufacturers can find development space in the weak parts of strong connector competitors. The so-called weak link refers to the large connector manufacturers in meeting the needs of customers in this field (such as price, delivery time, service) There is a difference between the means and methods adopted and the highest customer satisfaction. The customer satisfaction is not high, which is the market opportunity that can be replaced.
3. The ability and resources of an enterprise are suitable for providing high-quality connectors or services in this market. This requires connector manufacturers to assess the situation, not only to understand and master the market, but also to know their own capabilities and resources, and act according to their ability. The market is best and there are no strong competitors at the moment.
The products in the connector niche market can be specific connector types, such as optical fiber connector or burn in connector, or a single market segmentation product, such as medical connector, or specific connector family, such as D-sub connector. It is more likely to be customized connector for specific application with intellectual property rights. As mentioned above, the product market of niche market is not wide, but the turnover of niche products is not small. In the connector industry camp, several connector manufacturers use niche market strategy to focus on military connector, so as to enter the global top 20 connectors.

The larger connector niche players are Fischer, Lemo, and ODU / ODU. These connector manufacturers have developed complete specifications of high reliability circular connectors in the fields of medical, military and measurement equipment. These connectors can perform well in challenging environments (from battlefield to medical operating room). Many of them have intellectual property rights and are designed for specific application requirements.

Glenair, souriau and Deutsch are representatives of suppliers of mixed circular and rectangular connectors for defense, aviation and space. Their connectors are also used in deep-sea exploration and ocean development equipment. These connectors are often developed according to military standards, with extraordinary times of plugging and reliability. These products also have high sealing, anti electromagnetic interference and anti-static. Suppliers in this field have systematically and comprehensively tested connector products, and have detailed test records to prove the reliability of their products in critical situations. For this niche market, connector price is not the most concerned.

The increasing demand for power distribution and heat dissipation management has aroused the interest of power connector manufacturers. Anderson power products and posetronic industries have developed a wide range of high-performance power connectors, which are well-known in this field. Their product specifications range from a few amperes to several hundred amperes, wire to wire connectors, line to board connectors and board to board connectors.

Jerrik, sabritec and spectrum advanced specialty products have developed connectors with electromagnetic interference and electrostatic protection. Many of their connectors integrate filtering into the connector interface, including D-sub, military circular connector and automotive market connector. There are many very small connector manufacturers in this segmented market. They customize connectors with filtering function for customers.

Some connector manufacturers even focus on the narrower market. For example, Schaffner and schulter produce iec60320-1 AC power module connector with filtering function.

Trompeter Electronics (Emerson Network Energy Branch), Rosenberger and Radiall focus on RF coaxial connectors and impedance adjustable connectors.

Airborn, hypertronics and omninics are typical connector manufacturers dedicated to customized high-performance connectors and cable components. The development of this kind of customized connector needs a strong and comprehensive design ability, because the interface of this kind of connector requires unique size, terminal density, reliability, plug and pull times, performance and low combining force. All these requirements are bound to make the developer a technology intensive enterprise, and the management mode of this type of connector company is also customized to fit for small batch and multiple Batch, with high-tech density, high flexibility and high-quality staff operation mode.

Yazaki and Delphi are the top 10 connector manufacturers in the world, but their products are almost all automotive connectors.

Felfuse is a highly specialized manufacturer of communication standard connectors. Their products include RJ45 connectors with filtering function and without filtering function. Recently, they acquired cinch, expanded their product line and market share, and entered the second group of connectors.

Mill Max offers a wide range of pogo pin test heads and a wide range of IC sockets.

Smaller niche market connector companies choose a single connection technology to provide unique connector solutions.

Neoconix has developed a high-density connector that can be used as a socket or backplane connector for semiconductor components. Each spring piece in the small box is used to connect the flexible circuit board and each circuit of the circuit board.

Paricon technologies has developed a very short elastic body interface composed of a row of conductive spheres. When these spheres with material anisotropy are pressed, they will produce low resistance multi-point contact, forming an ideal contact interface!

Emerging markets such as solar, wind and nuclear power industries may be the time for new companies to introduce connectors that meet unique performance requirements and special environmental requirements. The rapid expansion of the new generation of LED lamp holder means a large number of LED bulb socket market, which may be enough to cultivate a new generation of lighting connector manufacturers.

Regardless of its size, we can say that the connector industry always offers opportunities for innovative solutions with competitive prices!

Summary:

·The connector industry is made up of many connector suppliers, ranging from international groups providing complete connector series to micro enterprises providing connectors based on single technology.

·Niche connector manufacturers fill an important market gap in the electronic industry, because connector rulers are not suitable for producing small quantities and require unique products.

·Connector suppliers in some industries are wholly owned subsidiaries of parent companies in some industrial fields.

·Smaller independent connector vendors have limited resources, and they use their expertise to focus on small volume, multi specification applications. Custom connectors and connector cable assemblies with high technology content tend to have little competitive pressure and are a good source of revenue.

·Niche connector manufacturers focus on the development of a single variety of products to supply to a relatively narrow market, but customized customer support to customer satisfaction. They tend to have a keen sense of smell to detect industrial demand earlier and faster (before market demand matures to attract larger connector manufacturers).

·Connector customers tend to be more conservative about new connectors developed by new companies. They are not willing to adopt new technology connectors developed by suppliers that are not approved by them. However, they may be attracted by good performance advantages and price advantages.