White Horse Laboratories is on the front lines of the counterfeit component battle, and Mark Rinehart, Founder and Managing Director reports on the increasing sophistication of these bad actors unleashing both old parts being sold as new, and new companies flooding the market with clones. This eye-opening conversation explains how counterfeiters are responding to the shortages in memory in increasingly brazen ways, including posting videos of how to refurbish an old memory device and sell it as new. White Horse Labs considers itself the Guardians of Technological Integrity, helping companies first identify these bad parts and then prevent them getting into electronics. Mark explains in detail exactly what electronics companies are up against in these turbulent times for global manufacturers and what they can do.

Luminovo’s Sam Mason shares news with EMSNOW about the company’s manufacturing modules and the industry’s response to solutions for automating the quoting process. Sam explains how Luminovo’s precise modeling of an EMS’ manufacturing services can dramatically reduce the time it takes to respond to a request for a quote from customers. They take data from EMS’ actual operations to allow them to very accurately model their specific total manufacturing costs by PCB facility. e.g. whether in California or Washington or Texas, and then generate an accurate, comprehensive quote in hours rather than weeks.

For OEMs, the Luminovo platform enables companies to gather compliance data to reduce risk. The discussion covers how customer expectations have evolved and how AI has accelerated what is possible.

Luminovo just introduced a tool called Electronics GPT: a Chat GPT- style interface that marries the data precision of their platform to a user interface that is becoming so familiar to customers. Sam invites listeners to play around with it at https://www.electronicsgpt.luminovo.com/. The conversation ends with information about coming trade shows where listeners in North America can meet Sam and learn more about these powerful tools.

EMSNOW learns about Vinrox Technologies from Co-Founder and CEO Ashvin Navadia. This relatively new (est. 2018) EMS in western India is dedicated to an OEM’s three most critical requirements: high quality PCBAs delivered on time, at a fair price. Ashvin explains his background and how his company’s unique value proposition serves the blazing hot market for electronics manufacturing services in India. This company was one we visited on the EMSNOW On Tour India this fall and Ashvin impressed our team with his visionary strategy. They discuss the region’s prospects for competing with China on the global stage, as well as Vinrox’s target end markets, expanding capabilities and unique differentiators. You won’t want to miss this insightful conversation about this rapidly changing area of the world.

EMSNOW is briefed on White Horse Laboratories’ expansion into the Americas by Jen Casey, Regional Sales Manager – Americas. Having spent 20 years in the broker world, Jen is well versed on the value of the work White Horse Labs offers for counterfeit risk mitigation on components that may be reaching their date code expiration and so forth. She explains some of their other service offerings, including programming, failure analysis, logistics, and tariff management. One development that she noted is the launch of SAE’s AS6171, which is more flexible than the older AS 6081 and has brought new efficiency to that counterfeit component certification process. This information packed discussion is well worth a listen.

EMSNOW discusses data automation in the EMS industry in India with Priyank Soni, Growth Manager of CalcuQuote, a quoting software platform designed for EMS. Priyank argues that EMS companies need to fully adopt Industry 4.0 in order to seize the opportunities arising from the very aggressive growth targets projected for this geography. Whoever has the strongest supply chain will win the business, he explains, and that comes from being able to increase operational capabilities through accurate data automation, especially the quoting process. Eric notes that in his latest EMSNOW Tour of India he saw CalcuQuote implemented in many EMS operations. The discussion covers details of the features and benefits of the platform. The two conclude that moving fast is critical to capturing the promises of the EMS market in India.

In Part 2 of this essential interview Dale Ford, Chief Analyst of ECIA explains his interpretation of semiconductor cycles and what it means for the overall industry. He goes deep into specific semiconductor categories, how the cycles impact the component channel, and what we can expect from where we are in this specific cycle. The conversation then turns to interpreting economist forecasts and a new AI-driven analyst tool employed at ECIA for pulsing the CEOs, and the implications of the accelerating rate of growth in electronics.

The discussion concludes with news about ECIA’s decision to offer its reports for sale to non-members, and how and where those can be accessed,. (www.ecianow.org/purchase-stats-reports).

Don’t miss this wide-ranging, 2-part conversation for an expert analysis of where the industry is headed in 2026.’s

Here’s a link to Part 1>>

EMSNOW catches up with Dale Ford, Chief Analyst for the Electronic Components Industry Association (ECIA) for this exclusive, must-see conversation about supply chain trends in this critical part of EMS companies’ financial well-being. Fresh from his association’s Executive Conference, Dale unpacks the latest data about the component categories that matter most: what’s behind the recent memory chip shortages, what the end markets tell us about where growth will come from, and how tariffs impact the component channel. In Part 1 of this data-packed analysis, they start at a 30,000 foot level, but get into the details of what EMS needs to know about what happened in 2025, and where 2026 is headed. Part 2 of this interview follows.

Electronics manufacturing in Mexico and South America is evolving quickly in response to global trends. In this insightful conversation with industry veteran Heriberto Cuevas, Sales Manager and Team Leader, Mexico and South America, Koh Young America, EMSNOW gets an update about the trends and market shifts. This dynamic geography has steadily risen in the value chain, producing high quality, complex electronics for medical as well as the traditional 3As – automotive, appliances, and aerospace.

The discussion includes the synergies between market sectors in the region, impressions from the recent SMTA show in Chicago, the role of AI in electronics manufacturing, and news about upcoming Koh Young America technical webinars.

Koh Young Academy webinars are intended to improve customers’ and potential customers’ skills and knowledge about Koh Young AOI systems. These webinars will launch November 19, and will take place every two months after that. Topics will reflect customer feedback data. EMSNOW will be on the look out for more information, so check our Coming Events sections on our home page to sign up.

Rajendra Velagapudi, Managing Director & CEO, Cyient DLM updates EMSNOW on his company’s most recent quarterly results and recent strategic initiatives. Cyient DLM (Design-Led Manufacturing) was one of the companies visited on the On Tour India trip, and Eric continues the conversation from last month digging more deeply into what it means to be ‘design led’.

Rajendra explains the difference between ‘build to print’ and ‘build to spec’ and how this change of focus brings more value to customers. Cyient DLM is very strong in highly regulated end markets, including defense, aerospace, EV, and medical systems, he says, which reflects his own engineering background and experience.

The discussion also covers how the growth in the domestic market for electronics is a very healthy element in the overall prospects for India.

This conversation helps provide the background and context to understand why India continues to be of critical interest to anyone following global trends in electronics manufacturing.