SEC/N Thoughts

Did you ever see one of those old Westerns where the buffaloes are stampeding right into the camera? Can you say, " SEMICON China, March 26 and 27?" If the wave of SEMICON China attendees who flooded the show floor was any indication of things to come, the recession is about over, folks!

Many of those attendees beat a straight line for SEC/N's booth and, with the exception of a few welcome moments of relief around lunch, it didn't let up for two days. The request for information was virtually insatiable, and I can say without a doubt that used equipment is a big hit in China.

That's the good news. The bad news is that there still remains a lot of education to be done on the part of both companies and government officials. And by that I don't just mean the Chinese. The approach taken by both sides over the years to buying and selling used equipment has been lacking in understanding, to say the least. The Chinese companies have ended up getting stuck with an enormous amount of equipment that they have never been able to install, and many of the outside companies selling equipment into China learned the hard way about Chinese contracts when they tried to collect.

SEC/N, in conjunction with the Reed Electronics Group, sponsored a conference on used equipment at the Rainbow Hotel in Shanghai, the day after the SEMICON show. An illuminating comment made by a local government official was that, unfortunately, used semiconductor equipment is placed in the same category as used medical equipment and is often guilty by association. China's experience in the past with used medical equipment injuring patients has led to tight and sometimes ambiguous rules with regard to what used equipment can and cannot be imported.

The stampede is on. But with the help of governments, associations and informational organizations such as the Reed Electronics Group, SEC/N has accepted the challenge of bringing new direction to the "herd."