CIE 40th Anniversary Standing on the shoulders of giants


In 2024 Components in Electronics (CIE) celebrates its 40th anniversary and on behalf of the ecsn Leadership Team and its membership chairman Adam Fletcher offers congratulations and sincere thanks to the magazine’s editorial staff present and past and to its publishers Datateam Business Media Ltd on their achievement. For well over 50 years the Electronic Components Supply Network (ecsn), has successfully collaborated with the UK’s technical media, most importantly in the acceptance and publication of the contributions that enable the association to share timely and relevant updates about the UK and global electronic components markets with the wider electronic components supply industry. In this article Fletcher takes the opportunity to look back at two of the most fundamental challenges faced by both the publishing and electronic components industry in recent decades and concludes by sharing his thoughts about the challenges still to come...


Common roots


It’s not too much of a stretch to accept that Components in Electronics and ecsn share common roots. Way back in 1970 a gentlemen called Roy Atterbury was editor of a magazine called Electronic Components and in addition to that role was also the creator and editor of the ‘Distributor Survey’, a title that today called ‘Distributor Directory’ is compiled and published each year by CIE. At the time the UK’s rapidly emerging electronic components distribution industry was an uncontrolled market, both erratic and disorganised. Atterbury was concerned that many people / businesses were calling themselves ‘distributors of electronic components’ but had in reality little regard for their customers or their businesses and were just out to make a quick buck by simply ‘brokering’ electronic components. Writing an editorial leader in Electronic Components Atterbury proposed the formation of a trade association that might be able to exert some control over how the market was developing and be a positive influence on organisations within it. This editorial was picked up by Waldo Thorn, then managing director of Celdis (a large distributor), who contacted George Stewart of SASCO (the UK’s first genuine distributor) and Ronnie Luckman at STC Electronic Services, who between them reached out to all the other executives in the emerging electronic components supply industry. In June 1970 the first meeting of the Association of Franchised Distributors of Electronic Components (afdec) was held at London’s Tower Hotel. Twenty-one delegates elected George Stewart, chairman for the first year, to be succeeded the following year by Waldo Thorn. Appropriately, Atterbury was elected to the role of secretary. The association flourished and over the next eighteen years the founders were joined by a wide range of components manufacturers and distributors under the annual chairmanship of industry stalwarts such as Tom Jermyn (Jermyn Industries) Keith Pierson (ITT-ESD),


26 December/January 2024


October 2005 - The “Three Amigos” …Centre: Roy Atterbury – Founder / Secretary afdec 1970 – 1988 Right: Gary Kibblewhite – Chairman 1988 – 2005 Left: Adam Fletcher – Chairman 2005 – to date.


Brian Murdoch (ITT-ESD) and John Walker (Compstock) to name but a few. Gary Kibblewhite was then appointed chairman of afdec in 1988 and remained in the role for seventeen years before handing over the reins to Adam Fletcher in 2005.


1970s and 80s: A decade of mergers and acquisitions


Both the UK publishing and electronic components distribution industry have undergone a huge range of mergers and acquisitions, primarily aimed at driving greater economies of scale within the acquiring organisations. When CIE was founded in 1984 all magazines and newspapers were traditionally produced, with content roughly laid out for editorial approval, then typeset, proof-read, assembled, and traditionally printed. The magazine was then made available via newsagents or postal subscription, or very often posted to named individuals (the target customers of advertisers) in a controlled circulation. The print industry is volume driven with the traditional “typesetting” being the most


Components in Electronics


costly element. The actual cost per printed copy was much the same whether the print run was 1000 or 100,000 units. It therefore made financial sense to try and reduce the typesetting costs. This was achieved by publishers investing heavily in expensive computer-based typesetting and high-speed


printing equipment that greatly improved quality, efficiency and accuracy, whilst reducing costs but was fiercely resisted by many print trades unions at the time. Meanwhile, in the electronic components markets distributors were making huge investments in sales, marketing, applications, logistics and administration staff, and purchasing an extensive range of inventory from a wide range of components manufacturers, all of which greatly increased their operating costs. At this time “Buy Own” was the predominant model in the electronic components distribution industry. In a rapidly growing market huge swings in demand or supply put pressure on the cash flow requirements of these authorised distributors businesses, causing their profitability to fluctuate wildly. Authorised distributors bought components from the manufacturer at price X with the expectation of selling at price X+ (30 per cent was considered the norm) but fierce competition for market share between components manufacturers (who were also trying to maximise economies of scale) and price competition between their competing distributors, resulted in huge price erosion over a frighteningly short time. The fortunes


Forecasting: Always a combination of insight, data and good luck.


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