6,500 EMS Companies? That’s Inflation!

How many EMS companies are there in the US?

Key Tronic president and chief executive Craig Gates says he read “there are something like 6,500 different EMS companies.”

I’m not sure where he read that, but it certainly wasn’t in CIRCUITS ASSEMBLY. Best we can tell — and we have a directory that lists every company we know of — there are something less than 1,300 in North America.

Now, I’m willing to acknowledge we might be missing a few sites. But we’re certainly not off by 5,200. Perhaps the count Gates saw included all assembly operations — including those of OEMs. Even so, that’s some fuzzy math.

This entry was posted in Hot Wires and tagged , by Mike. Bookmark the permalink.

About Mike

Mike Buetow is president of the Printed Circuit Engineering Association (pcea.net). He previously was editor-in-chief of Circuits Assembly magazine, the leading publication for electronics manufacturing, and PCD&F, the leading publication for printed circuit design and fabrication. He spent 21 years as vice president and editorial director of UP Media Group, for which he oversaw all editorial and production aspects. He has more than 30 years' experience in the electronics industry, including six years at IPC, an electronics trade association, at which he was a technical projects manager and communications director. He has also held editorial positions at SMT Magazine, community newspapers and in book publishing. He is a graduate of the University of Illinois. Follow Mike on Twitter: @mikebuetow