Mouser

Graham Munson: “The component market will stabilize by the end of 2023”

Posted on by Techtime

photo above: Graham Munson, Vice President of EMEA Customer Service at Mouser Electronics. Credit: Techtime

Over the past couple of years, the electronics components market has been impacted by a variety of factors, creating a new reality characterized by growing fluctuations in demands of products and consumer requirements which have challenges for generating long-term forecasts. Graham Munson, Vice President of EMEA Customer Service at Mouser Electronics, explains to Techtime: “Over the last two years, Europe, along with Israel, has emerged as the world’s most rapidly expanding region for procuring components.

“In 2022, Mouser’s European sales increased by approximately 30%. Currently, we are observing improvements in the global supply chain, resulting in shorte lead times. This impact is most evident in Asia, where the market is focused mainly on consumer goods. We are also witnessing global inflation and higher interest rates which usually lead to less consumer spendings.

“Today the majority of components available to order from Mouser have very short lead times, except for select products such as large FPGAs or some microcontrollers. Following a boost in sales during 2021-2022, we experienced stability in Q1 2023, and forecast a slower market in Q2 and Q3 2023, as a result of the growing inventories of our costumers. We expect a renewed growth in Q4 2023, or at the latest in Q1 2024. ”

“Israel is a people’s market”

According to Munson, the current market is very dynamic and thus “more difficult to provide long-term forecasts”. Even though the Israeli market falls under Mouser’s European region and contributes 9% to the overall European sales, it possesses distinctive features: “This market has an extremely high technological specialty and is constantly growing. Israel is a people’s market, and interpersonal relations are essential for Israelis.”

Mouser does not hold local offices in Israel. Instead, local activities are conducted through MI Catalog (Mouser Israel), a local Israeli company located in Ra’anana and owned by Moshe Elbas. MI Catalog provides engineering support for Israeli costumers and take care of order processing; costums release and local deliveries to customers.

Do you feel the impact of the war in Ukraine?

Munson: “We observe considerable impacts. Energy costs have doubled, and it affects the whole business world. Our customers are currently analyzing their expenses and searching for methods to decrease them.”

What are the main developments at Mouser?

“In the last 18 months, we doubled our inventories. Our new warehouse in Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, is currently in the advanced construction phase and is expected to be fully operational by the beginning of 2024. The new building will feature a triple-mezzanine floorplan, advanced automation, and a skybridge connecting it to the existing distribution center building.

“Upon completion of the new construction, Mouser’s 78-acre global headquarters and massive distribution center will consist of almost 1.5 million square feet to accommodate Mouser’s vast inventory of 1 million unique SKUs for products and technologies.

“Once the warehouse is complete, we will fill it with components. It is highly important for us to provide the market with new products, as customers would rather have a single point of purchase. On Mouser.com, our customers can search for more than 6.8 million products from over 1,200 manufacturer brands as well as have access to customer-focused online tools and resources to simplify and optimize the component selection and purchasing process.

“With Mouser, design engineers can get what they want, when they need it.”

Mouser Broke Ground on an Automatic Warehouse

Posted on by Techtime

Mouser Electronics has started its expansion phase earlier than planned, and recently broke ground on a 416,000-square-foot, three-story building (green building above) that will expand its distribution center, located south of Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas. Upon completion of the new construction, Mouser’s 78-acre global headquarters and massive distribution center will consist of almost 1.5 million square feet to accommodate Mouser’s vast inventory of 1 million unique SKUs (6.8 million components) from over 1,200 electronic component manufacturers.

The new building will feature a triple-mezzanine floorplan, advanced automation, and a skybridge connector to the existing distribution center building. It will be equipped with Vertical Lift Modules (VLMs). Essentially, they are giant vertical filing cabinets, complete with shelves and an automated extractor to bring the components to the employee’s workstation. This increases efficiency and floor space and can reduce an employee’s walking time by 45% or more. In spring 2022, Mouser completed installation of 120 such vertical lift modules.

The sixth phase of expansion

In addition, Mouser’s distribution center features multiple Ultipack and I-Pack machines – a sophisticated automated systems for sealing and labeling shipments that can process up to 14 orders per minute. The I-PACK packaging systems, for example, automatically produce the rightsized carton box for each delivery. Owned by Berkshire Hathaway through TTI, Mouser is a global distributor of electronic components, focused on developers, product prototyping and New Product Introduction (NPI) markets. The 3,500 employees company keeps in its warehouses approximately $1.2 billion worth of components. It is estimated that Mouser’s revenues are expected to reach $3 billion in 2022.

Graham Maggs, Mouser VP Marketing for EMEA
Graham Maggs, Mouser VP Marketing for EMEA

Graham Maggs, VP Marketing for EMEA, told Techtime that the new expansion project is the sixth phase of a strategic expansion plan drew up several years ago, but it was brought forward following rapid growth. Maggs: “Our Global sales grew by 40% in 2021, whereas the EMEA sales grew by 80%. We expect a 45% increase by the end of 2022. “In the last decade, Mouser has transformed from a company focused on the American market to the Global one.”

Customers will cancel double orders

“When I joined Mouser in 2010, most of its sales were in the Americas. As of today, only 43% of sales are in the Americas, and the rest is equally split between Asia and Europe.” Regarding the Global supply chain challenge, Maggs provides surprising insights: “We think that when the the supply chain improves and there will be larger availability of components, we will experience temporary and moderate decrease in orders. Currently, many customers issue duplicate orders, and when components reach to the market – some of these duplicate orders will be canceled.

“However, unlike similar past situations, this time we do not foresee a market breakdown, since there are too many active growth engines that are pushing the market. For eaxample Autonomous Vehicles, Military and Defense, Industry 4.0, Medical Equipment, and the IoT revolution in the consumer market. Our website has four million hits a day, most of them from RND teams and prototypes builders, so we can clearly see this trend, and thus expanding inventory.”

Vertical Lift Modules in action at the Mouser's Fort Worth, Texas, facility
Vertical Lift Modules in action at the Mouser’s Fort Worth, Texas, facility

“The Israeli market is exceptional”

“Israel is responsible for approximately 9% of our sales in Europe. The Israeli market is very unique: It is small, specialized and always growing. In the last years we see here a 50% annual growth. Since it is a very technological oriented market, we provide technical support to our local customers through our partner MI Catalog company. We offer engineering support only in Israel and supply the Israeli orders directly from Texas, not through Europe.”

Mouser does not hold offices in Israel. The local activities are carried out through MI Catalog (Mouser Israel), a local Israeli company located in Ra’anana and owned by Moshe Elbas. According to Sales Manager Mark Nudelman, the company is both a Mouser’s exclusive representative and a business partner.