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North American Electronics Supply Chain Reflects Moderate Growth

Sales of printed circuit boards (PCBs) and new orders for electronic products were up in April. The trend in April, however, indicates that moderate growth is likely to continue in the coming months. Sales results for the Electronics Manufacturing Services (EMS) industry for the year 2010 have shown a steady upward climb continuing into 2011. Current data support the view that most segments of the electronics industry have fully recovered from the 2008-2009 recession. Sales in the EMS, PCB and semiconductor industries, as well as U.S. new orders for electronics are now well above their December 2007 levels. IPC's PCB book-to-bill ratio was above parity (1.0) for 17 consecutive months until October 2010 and in April 2011 it inched up to 0.96. The book-to-bill ratio leads sales in the PCB industry by an average of three to six months.