“This year, the distribution industry is experiencing solid growth of around 15%”, details Glyn Dennehy, TTI’s VP Europe. “We are on track to grow by 35% in revenue terms this year. What’s more, if we look at our performance over the last three years, we will have achieved a CAGR of 28.9% in a market (passives and emech) where the European TAM has only grown by around 3%. In other words we are rapidly gaining market share.”
TTI has been seen by many commentators as a relatively new player on the European scene. And of course it is easy to achieve high growth figures when starting from a small base. But TTI is no longer a small player – in fact the company, predicts Dennehy, will end 2006 positioned as the ninth largest distributor (by revenue) in Europe – so the sales performance is a genuine reflection of market validation of TTI’s approach.
Dennehy: “Another point to remember is that we only sell low value items such as capacitors, resistors, inductors, connectors, relays. All the other major distributors sell semiconductors as well. If you just look at passive components, TTI is Europe’s second largest distributor.”
The relationship TTI has with its suppliers is most simply represented by the number of awards the company has received this year. Murata, FCI, Kemet, Bourns, Harwin, Amphenol and Phoenix Contact have all named TTI Europe in a roll call of honours.
By working so closely with a small number of leading players, TTI is able to deliver excellent customer service. But the distributor is also very active in establishing close working partnerships with its customer base too. Dennehy: “An increasing percentage – currently 30% – of our business goes through our inventory management system, whereby customers supply their forecasted component requirements directly to our system, so that we can manage any variances and address any supply chain issues before they become critical. This frees up resources at our customers enabling them to concentrate on what they do best.”
Notable investments this year have included a $1M Warehouse Control, System at TTI Europe’s headquarters in Maisach-Gernlinden. This has improved productivity and efficiency – resulting in even fewer errors.
