OPERATIONS
REVIEW
It is estimated that the Internet of Things (“IoT”) could generate
as much as US$4.0 trillion to US$11.0 trillion globally in 2025, with
the semiconductor industry poised to benefit from this exponential
expansion in this market. Demand for microcontrollers, sensors,
connectivity and memory are specific areas of opportunities for
the industry.
1
This in turn will likely result in increased demand for
burn-in services, which we are ready to capitalise on. Other areas of
opportunities include the growing automotive sector, including the
steady progression towards self-driving vehicles,
2
and the rise in data
centres. These industries will increase the demand for fail-safe devices
which will require high power burn-in services.
BURN-IN BOARD MANUFACTURING AND
PCBA SERVICES
We are involved in the designing and manufacturing of a wide range
of Burn-In boards for the various types of Burn-In systems as well as
boards for other types of reliability tests such as High Temperature
Operating Life Test and Highly Accelerated Stress Test. We are also
qualified and licensed to build Burn-In boards which are catered for
high power devices. We also provide niche Printed Circuit Board
Assembly (“PCBA”) services for industries ranging from medical and
mobile communications to aviation. We are constantly improving our
competencies inboarddesign, assembly andPCBAcapabilities tomeet
the dynamic and increasingly sophisticated customer requirements.
This segment contributed 40.4% as compared to 48.8% of the Group’s
revenue in FY15. This segment registered relatively stable revenues due
to revenue received from existing customers, new customers and PCBA
services. We continued to increase our capabilities and technological
know-how with the acquisition of new equipment that allowed us to
cater to more technologically demanding requirements. We were able
to leverage on this to extend and continue our growth towards sectors
such as the mobile communications and medical sectors. Under our
niche PCBA services, we developed fast turnaround solutions for our
mobile communications customers that needed advanced assembly
requirements andwe provided the widest variety of inspection solutions
for our electronics and aviation customers. We maintained our focus on
productivity improvement through process enhancement, automation
and the leveraging of IT. We also extended our supply chain through
the establishment of new contacts and competitive sources.
We anticipate that with more sophisticated consumer, industrial,
medical and other electronic devices, there will be demand for newer
types of semiconductor chips which will in turn propel the demand for
new burn-in boards for which we possess the design andmanufacturing
capabilities.
ENGINEERING SERVICES
The Group’s engineering services range from design, development
and full turnkey outsourced manufacturing and system integration
of semiconductor equipment to lab automation systems for the life
sciences and biotech industries. We also recommend enhancements
and improvements to our customers’ designs as a value-added
service to them. One of our competitive strengths is the provision
of system integration services for refrigeration-based High Power
Burn-In Systems and Lithography Tool for semiconductor front-end
applications. Currently, our integration projects also include Charged
Coupled Device cameras for astronomy and digital imagers for life
sciences applications. In addition, we distribute and service third-party
Mixed Signal Testers used in the semiconductor industry.
1
McKinsey & Company, The Internet of Things: Opportunities
and challenges for semiconductor companies. October 2015
[
insights/internet-of-things-opportunities-and-challenges-for-
semiconductor-companies]
2
Self-Driving Cars Could Mean Big Growth Opportunities
for NXPI [
-
mean-big-growth-opportunities-nxpi/]
14
AVI-TECH ELECTRONICS LIMITED
ANNUAL REPORT 2016
