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Senior Technical Editor Martin Rowe covers topics relating to general-purpose instrumentation, compliance, communications test, and anything else that comes along.



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Thursday, April 2, 2009

A keen sense of the obvious

Apr 2 2009 2:11PM | Permalink |Comments (1) |


I just received an e-mail from the investment bank Robert W. Baird & Co. The e-mail announced that Baird had released it's latest Test & Measurement Finanical Report. The report indicates that the test and measurement business, particularly the electronics and communications sector, in for a difficult ride. The life sciences sector will do better.

According to the report, he electronics and communications sector includes companies such as Agilent, Danaher (Fluke and Tektronix), Kelthley, LeCroy, Teradyne, and Verigy. It lists National Instruments in the industrial sector, which indicates that these investment bankers don't know much about the test market, where NI is a big player. Either that, or the bankers just can't understand the fact that a company can play in more than one of their segments.

If you can believe this report, the semiconductor ATE companies are in the most trouble based on Baird's forecasts. The others don't fare significantly better.

I couldn't understand too much from this report because I don't work in the financial sector. Thus, I found this report almost incomprehensible--and I have an MBA. It's loaded with undefined acronyms. Fortunately, was able to find Mergers and Acquisitions – A beginners guide from the University of Michigan, The guide explains the financial terms in ways that we engineers can understand.

All I really learned from this report is that it quantifies what we already know: The ecomomy has gone sour. I have to admire these investment bankers, though, for their keen sense of the obvious.

As I was reading the report, I received a phone call from Baird's PR agency. The PR person was calling to follow up on her e-mail to see if I'd received it (PR people, that's a big mistake). I told her that next year's report should include a glossary for those of us outside the finaicial community.


Related entries in: Electronics Business | Electronics Industry Mergers & Acquisitions | Electronics Market Research | Test & Measurement | Topical Taxonomy--Electronics | 


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