“Tech growth will be driven by displays”

ECN Asia spoke with Damien Tan, Area Sales Manager for Linear Technology, regarding the Company’s activities in Singapore. Excerpts:



How far back is Linear Technology’s operation in Singapore?

The first Singapore facility in Kallang JTC building opened in 1989. Then the Yishun facility opened in 1994, serving as the primary final electrical test location for all of Linear’s products. It is equipped and manned to match the company’s current revenue of approx $1.2 billion per year. In November 2005, Linear built another plant, at a cost of $100 million, adjacent to the Yishun test facility. Since then, the Singapore capacity has increased by 250 percent. Today, over 90 percent of Linear’s products worldwide are now tested here.



Aside from the test facility, you also have a design center here, right?

Yes, we develop high-performance analog products at the Singapore Design Center for use in applications such as industrial, instrumentation, high-end consumer, and communications systems. In addition, our facilities here include a major warehouse and worldwide distribution center. The bulk of the company’s shipments to end customers originate from Singapore. The ASEAN sales and support team is also based here, covering Singapore, Malaysia, India, Australia and New Zealand. A recent expansion of the Singapore operation in 2005 increased the facility to 250,000 sq ft.



What tech issues are customers most concerned about today?

One important issue today is the efficient use of circuit board real-estate. End-consumers want smaller but feature-rich portable devices with extended battery life. Linear Technology has strengths in these two areas. We build products that are high performance and provide excellent power efficiency, coupled with the smallest package sizes in the industry. Linear has an opportunity for significant growth in these areas. Another issue is green electronics,which focuses on clean, efficient and renewable energy. Customers will be moving in this direction and build their products to be friendlier to the environment.



Name a key application that will spur sales for Linear's product offerings.

Technology growth in 2007 will continue to be driven by displays. Just look at the number of products in the market that require displays -- HDTVs, cellphones, car navigation systems, portable media players, etc. The sizes of the displays will increase as system costs decline. Therefore, displays will be increasingly used in end products. This will benefit us in the sense that any device that has a display will require good power management, dimming control, and backlighting products to support the display function. So if you have a display on your portable device, you will definitely need highly efficient parts to prolong battery life. We have all these products to offer to our customers.



How different is Singapore’s electronics ecosystem? What makes it unique in terms of doing business?

The applications in Singapore are diverse. We focus on solving specific customer design challenges rather than targeting particular applications. That said, Linear Technology products are used in a broad range of applications, including telecommunications, networking products, computers and computer peripherals, video/multimedia, industrial instrumentation, security, high-end consumer products such as digital cameras and MP3 players, complex medical devices, automotive electronics, factory automation, process control and space systems. The Singapore government has done an excellent job in making Singapore a cost-effective region for business. It provides excellent infrastructure and efficient logistics that allow us to ship our products to all parts of the world in the shortest time. The other important ingredient for a successful business is people; here we have a diverse talent pool of managerial and technical expertise. These factors make Singapore a unique environment for doing business.



How do you see your business in Asia in the next few years?

Our business in this region remains positive. We expect Asia to be an important region for Linear Technology’s growth over the next ten years. As mentioned by many people in the industry, Asia will definitely remain a strategic location for manufacturing and R&D base. Asia will not only be a manufacturing base, but it increasingly provide customers more value-added services. Design activities are increasing in the region.



What steps are necessary to improve your business?

Given the current trends, we may need to expand our sales and field applications presence in the region. As I mentioned, there is an increase in design activity in the region so we also plan to invest more technical sales personnel in the region to capture this growth.