Manufacturing Technology

Molex Expands North American Manufacturing Capabilities with Opening of Second State-of-the-Art Factory in Guadalajara

Molex Expands NEws
Molex, a global electronics leader and connectivity innovator, today announced a major expansion of its global manufacturing footprint with the opening of a new factory in Guadalajara. The new 60,000 square-meter facility nearly doubles Molex's footprint and manufacturing space in Guadalajara, with the potential to increase capacity by an additional 100,000 square meters to support advanced engineering and large-scale production for automotive, transportation and industrial customers in North America and around the world.

"Our history in Mexico spans more than 50 years, earning Molex a strong reputation for developing world-class facilities and engineering talent to deliver customer-focused solutions, The opening of a new factory in Guadalajara dedicated to transportation customers further enhances our ability to effectively and economically address the most complex challenges in automotive connectivity, battery management, vehicle safety and zonal architectures."

-Mike Bloomgren, SVP, president, Transportation & Industrial Solutions, Molex.

Investing in Factory-of-the-Future Capabilities
Molex has invested $130 million in developing this state-of-the-art facility, which features new tools, technologies and processes to meet unprecedented demand for interconnect solutions for tomorrow's Electric Vehicles (EV), Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) and connected vehicles. The fully integrated plant incorporates factory-of-the-future capabilities, including advanced production-line automation, autonomous robots, cutting-edge molding and assembly tools, as well as complete engineering and operations to optimize product development, supply chain management, quality testing and volume manufacturing.

The availability of onsite reliability and metrology lab testing will empower local engineers to improve product designs and speed development cycles. A cornerstone of Molex's customer-centric approach, these local labs reduce rework costs and time at critical product-development stages. The use of innovative tests, simulations and analyses are designed to deliver industry-leading quality, streamline product certifications and accelerate time to market.

As part of Molex's overarching commitment to this region, an amenity-rich environment has been created to attract and retain highly skilled, local engineering talent. The company plans to grow its headcount from 200 employees to 300 by the end of the year. Moreover, the new Guadalajara plant complements the global footprint and customer focus of Molex's Transportation & Industrial Solutions division, which includes facilities and technical centers in Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, the Philippines, Poland, South Korea and the United States.

Customers Benefit from Supply Chain Optimization
Molex's Guadalajara expansion strategically shortens supply-chain cycles by enabling the local team in Mexico to expedite supply-and-demand decisions to mitigate product development and manufacturing risks. The opportunity to increase and align multiple, geographically dispersed supply sources improves Molex's overall resiliency in addressing changing market dynamics and disruptions on behalf of automotive customers globally.

Automotive Experience Counts:
Molex plays a vital role in the automotive industry, delivering the reliability, quality and innovations needed to ensure flawless connectivity for a vast array of applications. Dedicated automotive facilities across three continents enable Molex to offer unparalleled support to 30 of the largest global vehicle OEMs and hundreds of Tier 1 and 2 automotive suppliers. Continuous collaboration across the company aligns technology and talent in automotive, data communications, industrial and mobile consumer electronics to deliver the most diverse product portfolio on the market, encompassing ADAS, connected mobility, digital cockpits, electrification, high-speed networking, infotainment systems, vehicle antenna systems, noise cancellation sensing, vehicle-to-everything communications (V2X) and zonal architectures.

About Molex:
Molex is a global electronics leader committed to making the world a better, more-connected place. With presence in more than 40 countries, Molex enables transformative technology innovation in the automotive, data center, industrial automation, healthcare, 5G, cloud and consumer device industries. Through trusted customer and industry relationships, unrivaled engineering expertise, and product quality and reliability, Molex realizes the infinite potential of Creating Connections for Life.

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PsiQuantum, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group and Mitsubishi Chemical Announce Partnership to Design Energy-Efficient Materials on PsiQuantum’s

PsiQuantum | January 30, 2024

PsiQuantum and Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group announced that they are beginning work with Mitsubishi Chemical Group on a joint project to simulate excited states of photochromic molecules which have widespread industrial and residential potential applications such as the development of smart windows, energy-efficient data storage, solar energy storage and solar cells, and other photoswitching use cases. Qlimate, a PsiQuantum-led initiative that includes MUFG as a partner, focuses on using fault-tolerant quantum computing to crack the most challenging computational problems and accelerate the development of scalable breakthroughs across climate technologies, including more energy-efficient materials. Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG) is committed to supporting the world’s transition to a sustainable future, and to encourage industry access to the most promising breakthrough technologies. By pioneering PsiQuantum’s Qlimate solutions with industry leader Mitsubishi Chemical, MUFG is at the forefront of quantum computing for sustainability. This joint project will determine whether high-accuracy estimates of excited state properties are feasible on early-generation fault-tolerant quantum computers, specifically focusing on diarylethenes used for energy-efficient photoswitching applications. The project will allow Mitsubishi Chemical to gain early insights into how and when fault-tolerant quantum computing can be deployed in support of critical, scalable, sustainable materials. Because predicting the optical properties of materials requires complex analysis of excited states, standard algorithmic techniques for simulating these molecules (such as the Density Functional Theory, or DFT) often produce qualitatively incorrect results. The project will bring together Mitsubishi Chemical’s deep experience of computational chemistry and PsiQuantum’s leading expertise in fault-tolerant quantum computing to push the boundaries of approaching the complex physics in these systems and pave the way to developing new, more powerful energy-efficient photonic materials. Philipp Ernst, Head of Solutions at PsiQuantum, said: “PsiQuantum has dedicated teams who identify, describe and solve complex problem sets with best-in-class quantum algorithms. These are designed specifically to run on fault-tolerant quantum computers and will tackle previously-impossible computational challenges. This partnership will leverage our team’s unique know-how and Mitsubishi Chemical’s expertise in photochromic materials. We are grateful for MUFG’s visionary support in our mission to deploy high-impact quantum computing solutions to fight climate change.” Suguru Azegami, Managing Director, Sustainable Business Division, MUFG said: “We are excited to partner with PsiQuantum and Mitsubishi Chemical on our journey to explore possibilities of quantum computing technologies to solve the imminent global challenge. PsiQuantum’s vision to develop the first utility scale quantum computer before the end of the decade has inspired us, which led our initiative to participate in the Qlimate partnership as the first and sole member from Japan. Mitsubishi Chemical is leading efforts to use the cutting-edge technology to develop next generation materials and we are honored to support the company as its long term financial partner.” Qi Gao, Senior Chief Scientist, Mitsubishi Chemical said: “We are pleased to be part of the partnership and are grateful for MUFG’s support. Mitsubishi Chemical’s over 40 years background in computational chemistry and PsiQuantum’s domain specific knowledge for quantum control is a great fit with the collaboration effort of improving calculation accuracy on quantum device. We hope the partnership will accelerate the innovation of revolutionizing computational studies in chemistry and materials science.” About PsiQuantum PsiQuantum is a private company, founded in 2015 and headquartered in Palo Alto, California. The company’s only mission is to build and deploy the world’s first useful, large-scale quantum computer. Many teams around the world today have demonstrated prototype quantum computing systems, but it is widely accepted that much larger systems are necessary in order to unlock transformational applications across drug discovery, climate technologies, finance, transportation, security & defense and beyond. PsiQuantum’s photonic approach enables rapid scaling via direct leverage of high-volume semiconductor manufacturing and cryogenic infrastructure. The company is partnered with the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford University and Sci-Tech Daresbury in the United Kingdom. About Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. (MUFG) Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, Inc. (MUFG) is one of the world’s leading financial groups. Headquartered in Tokyo and with over 360 years of history, MUFG has a global network with approximately 2,000 locations in more than 50 countries. The Group has about 160,000 employees and offers services including commercial banking, trust banking, securities, credit cards, consumer finance, asset management, and leasing. The Group aims to “be the world’s most trusted financial group” through close collaboration among our operating companies and flexibly respond to all of the financial needs of our customers, serving society, and fostering shared and sustainable growth for a better world. MUFG’s shares trade on the Tokyo, Nagoya, and New York stock exchanges. About the Mitsubishi Chemical Group Corporation Mitsubishi Chemical Group Corporation (TSE: 4188) is a specialty materials group with an unwavering commitment to lead with innovative solutions to achieve KAITEKI, the well-being of people and the planet. We bring deep expertise and material science leadership in core market segments such as mobility, digital, medical and food. In this way, we enable industry transformation, technology breakthroughs, and longer, more fruitful lives for us all. Together, around 70,000 employees worldwide provide advanced chemistry-based solutions to deliver the core elements of our slogan — “Science. Value. Life.”

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MaxLinear Launches Product Design Kit for Active Electrical Cables Using Keystone PAM4 DSP

MaxLinear | February 02, 2024

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Teledyne Relays, Inc. | January 29, 2024

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