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UNITED STATES SECURITIES AND EXCHANGE COMMISSION
Washington, D.C. 20549


Form 10-K

(Mark One)  

ý

ANNUAL REPORT PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d) OF THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934

 

For the fiscal year ended October 2, 2004

 

or

o

TRANSITION REPORT PURSUANT TO SECTION 13 OR 15(d) OF THE SECURITIES EXCHANGE ACT OF 1934

 

For the transition period from                                to                                 

Commission file number: 0-21272

Sanmina-SCI Corporation
(Exact name of registrant as specified in its charter)

Delaware
(State or other jurisdiction of
incorporation or organization)
77-0228183
(I.R.S. Employer
Identification Number)

2700 North First Street, San Jose, CA
(Address of principal executive offices)

95134
(Zip Code)

Registrant's telephone number, including area code:
(408) 964-3500

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(b) of the Act:
None

Securities registered pursuant to Section 12(g) of the Act:
Common Stock, $0.01 Par Value
(Title of Class)

        Indicate by check mark whether the registrant (1) has filed all reports required to be filed by Section 13 or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934 during the preceding 12 months (or for such shorter period that the registrant was required to file such reports), and (2) has been subject to such filing requirements for the past 90 days. Yes ý    No o

        Indicate by check mark if disclosure of delinquent filers pursuant to Item 405 of Regulation S-K is not contained herein, and will not be contained, to the best of the registrant's knowledge, in definitive proxy or information statements incorporated by reference in Part III of this Form 10-K or any amendment to this Form 10-K. o

        Indicate by check mark whether the registrant is an accelerated filer (as defined in Exchange Act Rule 12b-2). Yes ý    No o

        The aggregate value of Common Stock held by non-affiliates of the Registrant was approximately $5,654,175,737 as of March 26, 2004, based upon the average of Registrant's Common Stock reported for such date on the Nasdaq National Market. Shares of Common Stock held by each executive officer and director and by each person who owns 10% or more of the outstanding Common Stock have been excluded in that such persons may be deemed to be affiliates. The determination of affiliate status is not necessarily a conclusive determination for other purposes. As of December 10, 2004, the Registrant had outstanding 523,306,783 shares of Common Stock.


DOCUMENTS INCORPORATED BY REFERENCE

        Certain information is incorporated into Part III of this report by reference to the Proxy Statement for the Registrant's annual meeting of stockholders to be held on February 28, 2005 to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission pursuant to Regulation 14A not later than 120 days after the end of the fiscal year covered by this Form 10-K.




SANMINA-SCI CORPORATION

INDEX

PART I.

Item 1.

 

Business

 

3
Item 2.   Properties   17
Item 3.   Legal Proceedings   19
Item 4.   Submission of Matters to a Vote of Security Holders   20

PART II.

Item 5.

 

Market for Registrant's Common Equity and Related Stockholder Matters

 

22
Item 6.   Selected Financial Data   23
Item 7.   Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations   23
Item 7A.   Quantitative and Qualitative Disclosures About Market Risk   51
Item 8.   Financial Statements and Supplementary Data   52
Item 9.   Changes and Disagreements With Accountants on Accounting and Financial Disclosure   52
Item 9A.   Controls and Procedures   52
Item 9B.   Other Information   53

PART III.

Item 10.

 

Directors and Executive Officers of the Registrant

 

53
Item 11.   Executive Compensation   53
Item 12.   Security Ownership of Certain Beneficial Owners and Management and Related Stockholder Matters   53
Item 13.   Certain Relationships and Related Transactions   53
Item 14.   Principal Accountant Fees and Services   53

PART IV.

Item 15.

 

Exhibits and Financial Statement Schedules

 

54
Signatures   104

2



PART I

Item 1. Business

Overview

        We are a leading independent global provider of customized, integrated electronics manufacturing services, or EMS. We provide these comprehensive services primarily to original equipment manufacturers, or OEMs, in the communications, personal and business computing, enterprise computing and storage, multimedia, industrial and semiconductor capital equipment, defense and aerospace, medical, and automotive industries. The combination of our advanced technologies, extensive manufacturing expertise and economies of scale enables us to meet the specialized needs of our customers in these markets in a cost-effective manner.

        Our end-to-end services in combination with our global expertise in supply chain management enable us to manage our customers' products throughout their life cycles. These services include:

        Our volume manufacturing services are vertically integrated, allowing us to manufacture key system components and subassemblies for our customers. By manufacturing key system components and subassemblies ourselves, we enhance continuity of supply and reduce costs for our customers. In addition, we are able to have greater control over the production of our customers' products and retain incremental profit opportunities for the company. System components and subassemblies that we manufacture include volume and high-end printed circuit boards, printed circuit board assemblies, backplanes and backplane assemblies, enclosures, cable assemblies, precision machine components, optical modules and memory modules.

        We manufacture products in over 20 countries on five continents. We seek to locate our facilities near our customers and our customers' end markets in major centers for the electronics industry or in lower cost locations. Many of our plants located near customers and their end markets are focused primarily on final system assembly and test, while our plants located in lower cost areas engage primarily in less complex component and subsystem manufacturing and assembly.

        We have become one of the largest global EMS providers by capitalizing on our competitive strengths, including our:

        This business strategy enables us to win large outsourcing programs from leading multinational OEMs. Our customers primarily consist of OEMs that operate in a range of industries. Our top customers include: Alcatel, S.A., or Alcatel; Applied Materials, Inc., or Applied Materials; EchoStar Communications Corporation, or EchoStar; Hewlett-Packard Company, or HP; Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, Inc., or Hitachi; International Business Machines Corporation, or IBM; Koninklijke Philips Electronics NV, or Philips Electronics; LSI Logic Corporation, or LSI; Nokia Corp., or Nokia; Nortel Networks, or Nortel; Roche

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Diagnostics Operations, Inc., or Roche; Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson, or Ericsson; and Tellabs, Inc., or Tellabs.

Industry Overview

        EMS companies are the principal beneficiaries of the increased use of outsourced manufacturing services by the electronics and other industries. Outsourced manufacturing refers to an OEMs' use of EMS companies, rather than internal manufacturing capabilities, to manufacture their products. Historically, EMS companies generally manufactured only components or partial assemblies. As the EMS industry has evolved, OEMs have increased their reliance on EMS companies for additional, more complex manufacturing services, including design services. Some EMS companies now often manufacture and test complete systems and manage the entire supply chains of their customers. Industry leading EMS companies offer end-to-end services, including product design and engineering, volume manufacturing, final system assembly and test, direct order fulfillment, after-market product service and support and global supply chain management.

        We believe increased outsourced manufacturing by OEMs is expected to continue because it allows OEMs to:

        Reduce Operating Costs and Capital Investment.    In the current economic environment, OEMs are under significant pressure to reduce manufacturing costs and capital expenditures. EMS companies can provide OEMs with flexible, cost-efficient manufacturing services. In addition, as OEM products have become more technologically advanced, the manufacturing and system test processes have become increasingly automated and complex, requiring significant capital investments. EMS companies enable OEMs to access technologically advanced manufacturing and test equipment and facilities, without additional capital expenditures.

        Focus on Core Competencies.    The electronics industry is highly competitive and subject to rapid technological change. As a result, OEMs increasingly are focusing their resources on activities and technologies in which they expect to add the greatest value. By offering comprehensive manufacturing services and supply chain management, EMS companies enable OEMs to focus on their core competencies, including next generation product design and development as well as marketing and sales.

        Access Leading Design and Engineering Capabilities.    The design and engineering of electronics products has become more complex and sophisticated and in an effort to become more competitive, OEMs are increasingly relying on EMS companies to provide product design and engineering support services. EMS companies' design and engineering services can provide OEMs with improvements in the performance, cost and time required to bring products to market. EMS companies are providing more sophisticated design and engineering services to OEMs, including the design and engineering of complete products following an OEM's development of a product concept.

        Improve Supply Chain Management and Purchasing Power.    OEMs face challenges in planning, procuring and managing their inventories efficiently due to fluctuations in customer demand, product design changes, short product life cycles and component price fluctuations. EMS companies employ sophisticated production management systems to manage their procurement and manufacturing processes in an efficient and cost-effective manner so that, where possible, components arrive on a just-in-time, as-and-when needed basis. EMS companies are significant purchasers of electronic components and other raw materials, and can capitalize on the economies of scale associated with their relationships with suppliers to negotiate price discounts, obtain components and other raw materials that are in short supply, and return excess components. EMS companies' expertise in supply chain management and their relationships with suppliers across the supply chain enable them to help OEMs reduce their cost of goods sold and inventory exposure.

        Access Global Manufacturing Services.    OEMs seek to reduce their manufacturing costs by having EMS companies manufacture their products in the lowest cost locations that are appropriate for their products and end customers. OEMs also are increasingly requiring particular products to be manufactured simultaneously in multiple locations, often near end users, to bring products to market more quickly, reduce shipping and logistics costs and meet local product content requirements. Global EMS companies are able to satisfy these requirements by capitalizing on their geographically dispersed manufacturing facilities, including those in lower cost regions.

        Accelerate Time to Market.    OEMs face increasingly short product life cycles due to increased competition and rapid technological changes. As a result, OEMs need to reduce the time required to bring their products to

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market. OEMs often can bring a product to market faster by using EMS companies' expertise in new product introduction, including manufacturing design, engineering support and prototype production. OEMs often can more quickly achieve volume production of their products by capitalizing on EMS companies' manufacturing expertise and global presence and infrastructure.

Company Overview

        We offer our OEM customers end-to-end services that span the entire product life cycle:

GRAPHIC

Competitive Strengths

        We believe that our competitive strengths differentiate us from our competitors and enable us to better serve the needs of OEMs. Our competitive strengths include:

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Our Business Strategy

        Our objective is to maintain and enhance our leadership position in the EMS industry. Key elements of our strategy include:

        Capitalizing on Our Comprehensive Services.    We intend to capitalize on our end-to-end services, which we believe will allow us to both sell additional services to our existing customers and attract new customers. Our end-to-end services include product design and engineering, volume manufacturing, final system assembly and test, direct order fulfillment, after-market product service and support and supply chain management. Our vertically integrated volume manufacturing services enable us to manufacture additional system components and subassemblies for our customers. When we provide a customer with a number of services, such as component manufacturing or higher value-added services, we are often able to improve our margins and profitability. Consequently, our goal is to increase the number of manufacturing programs for which we provide multiple services. To achieve this goal, our sales and marketing organization seeks to cross-sell our services to customers.

        Extending Our Technology Leadership.    We rely on advanced processes and technologies to provide our vertically integrated volume manufacturing services. We continually strive to improve our manufacturing processes and have adopted a number of quality improvement and measurement techniques to monitor our performance. We work with our customers to anticipate their future manufacturing requirements and align our technology investment activities to meet their needs. We use our design expertise to develop product technology platforms that we can customize by incorporating other components and subassemblies to meet the needs of particular OEMs. These technologies enhance our ability to manufacture complex, high-value added products, allowing us to continue to win business from existing and new customers.

        Original Design Manufacturing Solutions.    As a result of customer demand, and our customers' desire to manage research and development expenses, we have begun to offer product designs that our customer can either brand with its own name or integrate into its own system solution. In these cases, we act as the original design manufacturer, or ODM, for our customer. For ODM products, we typically retain the intellectual property rights and realize manufacturing revenue associated with building and shipping the product. Our current ODM portfolio covers several end markets, including enterprise computing, communications, and multimedia. For example, in the enterprise computing market, our two-processor 64-bit Opteron server is currently being shipped to multiple customers. The ODM server product roadmap includes multi-processor designs that will be scalable up to 32-processor systems.

        Continuing to Penetrate Diverse End Markets.    We focus our marketing efforts on major end markets within the electronics industry. We have targeted markets that we believe offer significant growth opportunities and for which OEMs sell complex products that are subject to rapid technological change because the manufacturing of these products requires higher value-added services. Our approach to our target markets is two-fold: We intend to strengthen our significant presence in the communications and enterprise computing markets, and also focus on other under-penetrated target markets, including the medical, industrial and semiconductor capital equipment, automotive, and defense and aerospace industries, many of which have not extensively relied upon

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EMS companies in the past. We intend to continue our diversification across market segments and customers to reduce our dependence on any particular market.

        Pursuing Strategic Transactions.    We seek to undertake strategic transactions that give us the opportunity to access new customers, manufacturing and service capabilities, technologies and geographic markets, to lower our manufacturing costs and improve the margins on our product mix, and to further develop existing customer relationships. For example, we recently completed the acquisition of Pentex-Schweizer Circuits Limited, a printed circuit board manufacturer, in order to provide lower cost manufacturing capacity in China for our customers. In addition, we will continue to pursue OEM divestiture transactions that will augment existing strategic customer relationships with favorable supply agreement terms or build new relationships with customers in attractive end markets. Potential future transactions may include a variety of different business arrangements, including acquisitions, spin-offs, strategic partnerships, joint ventures, restructurings, divestitures, business combinations and equity or debt investments. We intend to continue to evaluate and pursue strategic opportunities on a highly selective basis.

        Continuing to Seek Cost Savings and Efficiency Improvements.    We seek to optimize our facilities to provide cost-efficient services for our customers. We maintain extensive operations in lower cost locations, including Latin America, Eastern Europe, China and Southeast Asia, and we plan to expand our presence in these lower cost locations, as appropriate, to meet the needs of our customers. We believe that we are well positioned to take advantage of future opportunities on a global basis as a result of our vertically integrated volume manufacturing strategy.

Our Products and Services

        We offer our OEM customers end-to-end services that span the entire product life cycle. Examples of products that we manufacture for OEMs include wireless and wireline communications switches, personal computers, high-end computers and servers, avionics, medical imaging systems and digital satellite set-top boxes. The manufacture of these products may require us to use all or some of our end-to-end services.

        Each element of our end-to-end services is described in greater detail below.

        Product Design and Engineering.    Our design and engineering group, which we believe is one of the strongest in the EMS industry, provides customers with design and engineering services for initial product development, detailed product design and preproduction. This group complements our vertically integrated volume manufacturing capabilities by providing manufacturing design services for the manufacture of printed circuit boards, backplanes and enclosures. We provide initial product development and detailed product design and engineering services for products such as communications base stations, optical switches and modules, radio frequency amplifier modules, network switches, personal computers and servers.

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        Volume Manufacturing.    Volume manufacturing includes our vertically integrated manufacturing services described in greater detail below.

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        Final System Assembly and Test.    We provide final system assembly and test in which assemblies and modules are combined to form complete, finished products. We often integrate printed circuit board assemblies manufactured by us with enclosures, cables and memory modules that we also produce. Our final assembly activities also may involve integrating components and modules that others manufacture. The complex, finished products that we produce typically require extensive test protocols. Our test services include both functional and environmental tests. We also test products for conformity to applicable industry, product integrity and regulatory standards. Our test engineering expertise enables us to design functional test processes that assess critical performance elements, including hardware, software and reliability. By incorporating rigorous test processes into the manufacturing process, we can help to assure customers that their products will function as designed. Products for which we currently provide final system assembly and test include wireless base stations, wireline communications switches, optical networking products, high-end servers and personal computers.

        Direct Order Fulfillment.    We provide direct order fulfillment for our OEM customers. Direct order fulfillment involves receiving customer orders, configuring products to quickly fill the orders and delivering the products either to the OEM, a distribution channel (such as a retail outlet) or directly to the end customer. We manage our direct order fulfillment processes using a core set of common systems and processes that receive order information from the customer and provide comprehensive supply chain management, including procurement and production planning. These systems and processes enable us to process orders for multiple system configurations, and varying production quantities, including single units. Our direct order fulfillment services include BTO and CTO capabilities. BTO involves building a system having the particular configuration ordered by the OEM customer. CTO involves configuring systems to an end customer's order. The end customer typically places this order by choosing from a variety of possible system configurations and options. We are capable of meeting a 48 to 72 hour turn-around-time for BTO and CTO by using advanced manufacturing processes and a real-time warehouse management system and data control on the manufacturing floor. We support our direct order fulfillment services with logistics that include delivery of parts and assemblies to the final assembly site, distribution and shipment of finished systems, and processing of customer returns. Our systems are sufficiently flexible to support direct order fulfillment for a variety of different products, such as desktop and laptop computers, servers, workstations, set-top boxes, medical devices, scanners, printers and monitors.

        After-Market Product Service and Support.    We provide a wide range of after-market product service and support services, including replacing products at customer locations, product repair, re-manufacturing and maintenance at repair depots, logistics and parts management, returns processing, warehousing and engineering change management. We also provide support services for products that are nearing the end of their life cycles. These end-of-life support services involve both customer support and manufacturing support activities. We support the customer by providing software updates and design modifications that may be necessary to reduce costs or design-in alternative components due to component obsolescence or unavailability. Manufacturing support involves test engineering support and manufacturability enhancements. We also assist with failure product analysis, warranty and repair and field service engineering activities.

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Global Supply Chain Management

        Supply chain management involves the planning, purchasing and warehousing of product components. The objective of our supply chain management services is to reduce excess component inventory in the supply chain by scheduling deliveries of components on a just-in-time, as-and-when-needed basis. We use sophisticated production management systems to manage our procurement and manufacturing processes in an efficient and cost effective manner. We collaborate with our customers to enable us to respond to their changing component requirements for their products and to reflect any changes in these requirements in our production management systems. These systems often enable us to forecast future supply and demand imbalances and develop strategies to help our customers manage their component requirements. Our enterprise-wide software systems provide us with company-wide information regarding component inventories and orders to standardize planning and purchasing at the plant level. These systems enable us to transfer product components between plants to respond to changes in customer requirements or to address component or other raw material shortages.

        We purchase large quantities of electronic components and other raw materials from a range of suppliers. As a result, we often receive volume discounts or other favorable terms from suppliers, which can enable us to provide our customers with greater cost reductions than they can obtain themselves. Our supplier relationships often enable us to obtain electronic components and other raw materials that are in short supply or return excess inventories to suppliers even when they are not contractually obligated to accept them.

Our End Markets

        We have targeted markets that offer significant growth opportunities and for which OEMs sell complex products that are subject to rapid technological change, as the manufacturing of these products requires higher value added services. We believe that markets involving complex, rapidly changing products offer us opportunities to produce products with higher margins because these products require higher value added manufacturing services and may also include our advanced vertically integrated components. Our approach to our target markets is two-fold—we intend to strengthen our significant presence in the communications and computing markets, while also focusing on other under-penetrated target markets, including the medical, automotive, industrial and semiconductor capital equipment and defense and aerospace industries, many of which have not extensively relied upon EMS companies in the past. Our diversification across market segments and customers reduces our dependence on any particular market.

        Communications: Wireless, Optical and Wireline Transmission and Enterprise.    In the communications sector, we focus on wireless transmission systems, optical networking and wireline transmission systems and enterprise networking systems. Our product design and engineering staff has extensive experience designing advanced communications products for these markets. Products we manufacture include optical switches, wireless base stations, wireline switches, routers, transceivers, satellite receivers, radio frequency and point-to-point microwave systems, and Bluetooth appliances among others. Selected customers in communications equipment include Alcatel, Ericsson and Nortel.

        Computing: Personal and Business (Enterprise) Computing and Storage Systems.    We provide services for OEMs of personal computer, or PC, systems, enterprise computing, and storage systems.

        We provide services to multiple major PC manufacturers. These services include primarily BTO and CTO manufacturing of desktop PC systems serving primarily the enterprise markets. Our PC manufacturing plants can build and configure systems and have them ready for shipment within 48 to 72 hours of receipt of a customer order. These plants are typically located in the geographic region to which the finished system will be shipped to rapidly deliver finished products. We manufacture a wide variety of PCs and other PC components for our customers, including HP and IBM.

        We also provide services to the storage and server markets. Our expertise in manufacturing products for the storage and server markets stems from our technological capabilities and vertical integration. We are also the leading vertically integrated supplier of complex, multilayer printed circuit boards and backplanes, and many high-end computer designs incorporate these components. We have developed a proprietary enclosure design for high density servers used in data center applications. High-end computing products we manufacture include complex, fault tolerant servers and enterprise storage. Our customers in the storage and server markets include EMC Corporation, HP and Hitachi.

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        Multimedia.    We manufacture digital satellite set-top boxes, personal video recorders, digital home gateways and internet protocol entertainment devices. For our multimedia OEM customers, we manage the production process for multimedia products, including product design and engineering, test development, supply chain management, manufacturing of printed circuit boards and assemblies, final system assembly and test, and direct order fulfillment, including our BTO and CTO capabilities. Our major multimedia customers include EchoStar, Nokia, and Philips Electronics.

        Industrial and Semiconductor Systems.    Our expertise in manufacturing industrial instrumentation products includes production of semiconductor capital equipment, front-end environmental chambers, computer controllers, and test and inspection equipment. We also have significant experience manufacturing scanning equipment and devices, flat panel display test and repair equipment, optical inspection and x-ray equipment for use in the printed circuit board assembly industry, and deep ultraviolet photolithography equipment. Our industrial and semiconductor systems customers include Applied Materials, Electronics for Imaging and LSI.

        Defense and Aerospace.    In December 2001, we merged with SCI Systems, Inc., or SCI. SCI began operations as Space-Craft, Inc., in the early 1960's and was then principally a supplier to the defense and aerospace industries. We continue to offer our end-to-end services to the defense and aerospace industry. We believe that this industry currently represents a significant growth opportunity due to increased defense spending, as well as the growing desire of defense and aerospace OEMs to outsource non-core manufacturing activities to reduce costs. Our experience in serving the aerospace industry, as well as our product design and engineering capabilities, represent key competitive strengths for us in the defense and aerospace market. Defense and aerospace products that we manufacture include avionics systems, weapons guidance systems, cockpit communications systems, spread spectrum communications systems, and space systems. Key defense and aerospace customers include The Boeing Company, General Electric and Lockheed Martin Corporation.

        Medical.    We provide comprehensive manufacturing and related services to the medical industry, including design and regulatory approval support. The manufacturing of products for the medical industry requires compliance with domestic and foreign regulations, including the Food and Drug Administration's, or FDA's, quality system regulations and the European Union's medical device directive. In addition to complying with these standards, our medical manufacturing facilities comply with ISO 13485 (formerly EN 46002) and ISO 9001:2000. Medical products that we manufacture include magnetic resonance imaging equipment, blood glucose meters, computer tomography scanners, respiration monitors, ventilators, anesthesia workstations, infusion pumps, thermo-regulation devices, and cardio-resuscitation systems. Our medical customers include GE Medical Systems, Philips Medical Systems and Roche.

        Automotive.    In recent years, the electronics content in automobiles has increased substantially as new entertainment, wireless communication and navigation systems are being offered as standard features or factory options. We believe that this increased usage of electronic devices in automobiles will continue, and that there will be significant opportunities for EMS companies to manufacture automotive electronics. Accordingly, we have formed an automotive products group to focus on these opportunities. Our automotive customers include Saab, Valeo and Volvo.

Customers

        Our ten largest customers for fiscal 2004 (listed in alphabetical order) are Alcatel, Applied Materials, EchoStar, Ericsson, Hitachi, HP, IBM, Nokia, Nortel and Philips Electronics.

        A relatively small number of customers historically have been responsible for a significant portion of our net sales. Sales to our ten largest customers accounted for 69.3% of our net sales for the fiscal year ended October 2, 2004, 68.5% of our fiscal 2003 net sales and 65.8% of our fiscal 2002 net sales. Our two largest customers, IBM and HP, accounted for 28.4% and 12.0%, respectively, of our net sales for fiscal 2004. For fiscal 2003, IBM and HP accounted for approximately 28.8% and 9.6%, respectively, of our net sales.

        We seek to establish and maintain long-term relationships with our customers and have served many of our principal customers for several years. Historically, we have had substantial recurring sales from existing customers. We have also expanded our customer base through acquisitions and our marketing and sales efforts. We have been successful in broadening relationships with customers by providing vertically integrated products and services, as well as multiple products and services in multiple locations.

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        We typically enter into supply agreements with our major OEM customers with terms ranging from three to five years. Many of these supply agreements were entered into in connection with divestiture transactions, which are transactions in which we also acquire plants, equipment and inventory from the OEM. In these divestiture-related supply agreements, the customer typically agrees to purchase its requirements for particular products in particular geographic areas from us. Our OEM customer supply agreements that were not entered into in connection with divestitures typically do not require the customer to purchase their product requirements from us, and in these cases customers may have alternate sources of supply available to them. Our supply agreements with our OEM customers generally do not obligate the customer to purchase minimum quantities of products. However, the customer typically remains liable for the cost of the materials and components that we have ordered to meet the customer's production forecast but which are not used, provided that the material was ordered in accordance with an agreed-upon procurement plan. In some cases, the procurement plan contains provisions regarding the types of materials for which our customers will assume responsibility. Our supply agreements typically contain provisions permitting cancellation and rescheduling of orders upon notice and subject, in some cases, to cancellation and rescheduling charges. Order cancellation charges typically vary by product type and depend upon how far in advance of shipment a customer notifies us of the cancellation of an order. In some circumstances, our supply agreements with customers provide for cost reduction objectives during the term of the agreement.

        We generally do not obtain firm, long-term commitments from our customers under supply agreements. As a result, customers can cancel their orders, change production quantities or delay orders. Uncertain economic conditions and our general lack of long-term purchase contracts with our customers make it difficult for us to accurately predict revenue over the longer-term. Even in those cases where customers are contractually obligated to purchase products from us or repurchase unused inventory from us that we have ordered for them, we may elect not to immediately enforce our contractual rights because of the long-term nature of our customer relationships and for other business reasons, and instead may negotiate accommodations with customers regarding particular situations.

Backlog

        At October 2, 2004, our backlog was $2.4 billion, compared to $2.1 billion at September 27, 2003. Backlog consists of purchase orders received, including, in some instances, forecast requirements released for production under customer contracts. Cancellation and postponement charges generally vary depending upon the time of cancellation or postponement, and a portion of our backlog may be subject to cancellation or postponement without significant penalty. Customers may cancel scheduled deliveries and backlog may therefore not be a meaningful indicator of future financial results.

Marketing and Sales

        Our corporate marketing, sales and customer service staff consists of approximately 950 people. Our sales efforts are organized and managed on a regional basis, with regional sales managers in geographic regions in the United States and internationally.

        We develop relationships with our customers and market our vertically integrated volume manufacturing services through our direct sales force and customer support specialists. Our sales resources are directed at multiple management and staff levels within target accounts. Our direct sales personnel work closely with the customers' engineering and technical personnel to better understand their requirements. Our marketing and sales staff supports our business strategy of providing end-to-end services by encouraging cross-selling of vertically integrated volume manufacturing services and component manufacturing across a broad range of major OEM products. To achieve this objective, our marketing and sales staff works closely with our various manufacturing and design and engineering groups and engages in marketing and sales activities targeted towards key customer opportunities.

        Our key customer accounts are managed by a dedicated account team, including a global business manager directly responsible for account management. Global business managers coordinate activities across divisions to effectively satisfy customer requirements and have direct access to our senior management to quickly address customer concerns. Local customer account teams further support the global teams and are linked by a comprehensive communications and information management infrastructure. In addition, our senior management, including our chief executive officer, Jure Sola, and our president and chief operating officer,

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Randy Furr, are heavily involved in customer relations and devote significant attention to broadening existing, and developing new, customer relationships.

Competition

        We face competition from other major global EMS companies such as Celestica, Inc., Flextronics International Ltd., Hon Hai (FoxConn), Jabil Circuit, Inc. and Solectron Corporation, as well as other EMS companies that often have a regional or product, service or industry specific focus. In addition, our potential customers may also compare the benefits of outsourcing their manufacturing to us with the merits of manufacturing products themselves.

        We compete with different companies depending on the type of service or geographic area. We believe that the primary basis of competition in our target markets is manufacturing technology, quality, responsiveness, the provision of value-added services and price. To remain competitive, we must continue to provide technologically advanced manufacturing services, maintain quality levels, offer flexible delivery schedules, deliver finished products on a reliable basis and compete favorably on the basis of price. We believe that our primary competitive strengths include our ability to provide global end-to-end services, our product design and engineering resources, advanced technologies, high quality manufacturing assembly and test services, customer focus, expertise in serving diverse end markets and an experienced management team.

        In addition to EMS companies, we also compete, with respect to certain of the EMS services we provide, with ODMs. These companies, typically based in Asia, design products and product platforms that are then sold to OEMs, system integrators and others who configure and resell them to end users. To date, ODM penetration has been greatest in the personal computer, including both desktop and notebook computers, and low-end server markets.

Intellectual Property

        We hold various United States and foreign patents primarily related to printed circuit boards, methods of manufacturing printed circuit boards, and enterprise computing. For other proprietary processes, we rely primarily on trade secret protection. We also have registered trademarks in the United States and many other countries throughout the world. As the level of ODM services we provide increases, intellectual property will become of greater importance to our business.

        Although we do not believe that our current trademarks, manufacturing processes or patents infringe on the intellectual property rights of third parties, we cannot assure you that third parties will not assert infringement claims against us in the future. If such an assertion were to be made, it may become necessary or useful for us to enter into licensing arrangements or to resolve such an issue through litigation. However, we cannot assure you that such license rights would be available to us on commercially acceptable terms if at all or that any such litigation would be resolved favorably. Additionally, such litigation could be lengthy and costly and could materially affect our financial condition regardless of the outcome of such litigation.

        We were a party to an intellectual property dispute in which Gemstar and StarSight alleged with respect to SCI certain violations of the Tariff Act of 1930, including patent infringement, in the importation of set-top multimedia boxes manufactured outside the United States by SCI for EchoStar, another party in the case. For a more complete description of this litigation, see "Item 3—Legal Proceedings."

Environmental Controls

        We are subject to a variety of local, state and federal environmental laws and regulations in the United States, as well as foreign laws and regulations, relating to the treatment, storage, use, discharge, emission and disposal of chemicals, solid waste and other hazardous materials used during our manufacturing processes, as well as occupational safety and health laws, and product take back, product labeling and product content requirements. Proper waste disposal is a major consideration in particular for printed circuit board manufacturers because metals and chemicals are used in the manufacturing process. Water used in the printed circuit board manufacturing process must be treated to remove metal particles and other contaminants before it can be discharged into municipal sanitary sewer systems. We operate on-site wastewater treatment systems at our printed circuit board manufacturing plants in order to treat wastewater generated in the fabrication process.

        In addition, although the electronics assembly process generates significantly less wastewater than printed circuit board fabrication, maintenance of environmental controls is also important in the electronics assembly

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process because such operations can generate lead dust. We are undertaking remediation of lead dust in the interior of manufacturing facilities when vacating those facilities. Although there are no applicable standards for lead dust remediation in manufacturing facilities, we endeavor to make efforts to remove the residues. To date, lead dust remediation costs have not been material to our operations. We also monitor for airborne concentrations of lead in our buildings and are not aware of any significant lead concentrations in excess of the applicable OSHA standards.

        We have a range of corporate programs in place with regard to environmental compliance and reduction of the use of hazardous materials in manufacturing. In the environmental compliance area, we are developing corporate-wide standardized environmental management systems, auditing programs and policies to enable us to better manage environmental compliance activities. We are also developing programs to certify our facilities under ISO 14001, a set of standards and procedures relating to environmental compliance management. We are also implementing initiatives to reduce the use of hazardous materials in the manufacturing process. One of the first such programs is a program to reduce and ultimately eliminate the use of lead in soldering compounds. Initiatives to reduce the use of hazardous materials are being led by governmental authorities, electronics industry OEMs and manufacturers and we expect that these initiatives will grow in the future.

        Asbestos containing materials, or ACM, are present at several of our manufacturing facilities. Although the ACM is being managed and controls have been put in place pursuant to ACM operations and maintenance plans, the presence of ACM could give rise to affirmative remediation obligations and other liabilities. No third-party claims relating to ACM have been brought at this time.

        Each plant, to the extent required by law, operates under environmental permits issued by the appropriate governmental authority. These permits must be renewed periodically and are subject to revocation in the event of violations of environmental laws. Any such revocation could require us to cease or limit production at one or more of our facilities, thereby having an adverse impact on our results of operations.

        Primarily as a result of certain of our acquisitions, we have incurred liabilities associated with environmental contamination at facilities, including facilities of companies that we have acquired. These liabilities include ongoing investigation and remediation activities at a number of sites, including our facilities located in Irvine, California (a non-operating facility acquired as part of our acquisition of Elexsys); Owego, New York (a current facility that we acquired with our acquisition of Hadco Corporation); Derry, New Hampshire (a non-operating facility of Hadco) and Fort Lauderdale, Florida (a former facility of Hadco). Currently, we are unable to anticipate whether any third-party claims will be brought against us for the existence of such contamination. There can be no guarantee that third-party claims will not arise and will not result in material liability to us. In addition, there are several sites, including our facilities in Wilmington, Massachusetts (acquired from Altron); Clinton, North Carolina (acquired from Alcatel); Brockville, Ontario (acquired from Nortel) and Gunzenhausen, Germany (acquired from Alcatel) that are known to have groundwater contamination caused by a third party, and that third party has provided indemnity to us for the liability. Although we cannot guarantee you that we will not incur liability for clean-up costs or expenses at any of these sites, we have no reason to believe that such liability will occur and that it will be material to our business.

        We have also been named as a potentially responsible party at several contaminated disposal sites operated by other parties including the Casmalia Resources site, as a result of the past disposal of hazardous waste by companies we have acquired or by our corporate predecessors. Although liabilities for such historic disposal activities have not materially affected our financial condition to date, we cannot guarantee you that past disposal activities will not result in liability that will materially affect us in the future.

        We use an environmental consultant to assist us in evaluating the environmental liabilities of the companies that we acquire as well as those associated with our ongoing operations, site contamination issues and historical disposal activities in order to establish appropriate accruals in our financial statements. We have also undertaken a process of re-evaluating and updating the reserves over time. As of October 2, 2004, based on the evaluations of our consultants, we have accrued $16.9 million for such environmental liabilities. Although we believe these accruals are adequate, we cannot be certain that environmental liabilities will not exceed the accrued amounts.

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Employees

        As of October 2, 2004, we had 48,721 employees, including 13,212 temporary employees. None of our U.S. employees are represented by a labor union. In certain international locations, particularly in Western Europe, our employees are represented by labor unions on either a national or plant level. Western European countries also often have mandatory legal provisions regarding terms of employment, severance compensation and other conditions of employment that are more restrictive than U.S. laws. We have never experienced a strike or work stoppage and we believe that our relationship with our employees is good. We expect headcount reductions during fiscal 2005 associated with our phase three restructuring plan announced on July 20, 2004.

Available Information

        Our Internet address is http://www.sanmina-sci.com. We make available through our website, free of charge, our Annual Reports on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K and amendments to those reports filed or furnished pursuant to Section 13(a) or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, as amended, as soon as reasonably practicable after we electronically file such material with, or furnish it to, the Securities and Exchange Commission, or SEC. All reports we file with the SEC are also available free of charge via EDGAR through the SEC's website at http://www.sec.gov.


Item 2. Properties

        Facilities.    Our customers market numerous products throughout the world and therefore need to access manufacturing services on a global basis. To enhance our EMS offerings, we seek to locate our facilities either near our customers and our customers' end markets in major centers for the electronics industry or, where appropriate, in lower cost locations. Many of our plants located near customers and their end markets are focused primarily on final system assembly and test, while plants located in lower cost areas are engaged primarily in less complex component and subsystem manufacturing and assembly.

        As of October 2, 2004, we manufacture products in approximately 100 decentralized plants, consisting of more than 74 electronics assembly facilities, six printed circuit board fabrication facilities, four cable assembly facilities, 18 enclosure assembly facilities, as well as other specialized manufacturing facilities, located both domestically and internationally. Our domestic plants are located in key electronics industry centers including Silicon Valley, Southern California, New England, Texas, Northern Alabama, the Research Park Triangle area, and New York, as well as in several other locations. Internationally, we have plants in Australia, Latin America (Brazil and Mexico), Canada, Western Europe (United Kingdom, Ireland, France, Germany, Spain, Sweden, and Finland), Eastern Europe (Hungary), Israel and Asia (Peoples' Republic of China, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, and Thailand). For fiscal 2004, approximately 72.7% of our net sales were from operations outside of the United States.

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        As of October 2, 2004, the approximate square footage of our principal manufacturing facilities by country is as follows:

 
  Approximate
Square
Footage

Australia   65,554
Brazil   230,685
Canada   464,485
China   1,073,000
Finland   358,134
France   528,064
Germany   551,025
Hungary   881,708
Indonesia   33,119
Ireland   121,200
Israel   241,896
Japan   13,870
Malaysia   315,000
Mexico   1,572,223
Singapore   165,000
Spain   298,903
Sweden   276,782
Thailand   138,500
United Kingdom   890,903
USA   5,083,816
   
  TOTAL   13,303,867
   

        We also have manufacturing facilities that are closed or in the process of closing as of October 2, 2004, which include facilities totaling approximately 1,927,864 square feet for domestic locations and approximately 2,788,000 square feet for international locations. We are currently undertaking an aggressive program to sublease or terminate leases for unused facilities and to sell owned properties that are no longer expected to serve our future needs.

        As of October 2, 2004, our active manufacturing facilities consist of approximately 8.8 million square feet in facilities that we own, with the remainder in leased facilities under lease terms expiring between fiscal 2005 and fiscal 2021.

        Since the closing of our merger with SCI in December 2001, we have evaluated our global manufacturing operations and restructured our facilities and operations to bring our manufacturing capacity in line with demand and our manufacturing strategy and to provide cost efficient services for our customers. Through this process, we have closed certain facilities not required to satisfy current demand levels, but have retained strategic manufacturing facilities in the United States and Western Europe that focus on higher value added manufacturing activities. We provide extensive operations in lower cost locations, including Latin America, Eastern Europe, China and Southeast Asia, and we plan to expand our presence in these lower cost locations, as appropriate to meet the needs of our customers.

        We believe that our existing facilities are adequate to meet our reasonably foreseeable requirements. We regularly evaluate our expected future facilities requirements.

        Certifications and Registrations.    Certifications and registrations under industry standards are important to our business because many customers rely on them to confirm our adherence to manufacturing process and quality standards. Certain markets, such as communications, medical, defense, aerospace and automotive, require adherence to industry-specific standards. Substantially all of our manufacturing facilities are registered under ISO 9001:2000, a set of standards published by the International Organization of Standardization and used to document, implement and demonstrate quality management and assurance systems in design and manufacturing. As part of the ISO 9001:2000 certification process, we have developed a quality systems manual and an internal system of quality controls and audits. ISO 9001:2000 registration is of particular importance to

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the companies doing business in the European Community, and we believe that United States electronics manufacturers are increasing their use of ISO 9001:2000 registration as a criteria for suppliers.

        In addition to ISO 9001:2000, many of our facilities have been TL 9000 registered. TL 9000 is a relatively new telecommunications standard. The TL 9000 quality system requirements and quality system metrics are designed specifically for the telecommunications industry to promote consistency, efficiency, and improved customer satisfaction. Included in the TL 9000 system are performance-based metrics that measure the reliability and quality performance of the product. The majority of our facilities are also Underwriters Laboratory compliant. These standards define requirements for quality, manufacturing process control and manufacturing documentation and are required by many OEMs in the electronics industry, including suppliers to AT&T and the regional Bell operating companies.

        Our medical products division has identified certain manufacturing facilities to be centers of excellence for medical products manufacturing. Currently most of those facilities are FDA and ISO 13485 registered and fully compliant to the FDA's quality systems regulations.

        Our defense and aerospace operations are headquartered in the Huntsville, Alabama area and are housed in dedicated facilities to meet the specialized needs of our defense and aerospace customers. Our defense and aerospace facilities are AS9100 registered and also certified under various U.S. military specifications as well as under ANSI and other standards appropriate for defense and aerospace suppliers.

        Our automotive facilities are strategically located worldwide. Substantially all of our automotive facilities are QS 9000 and/or TS 16949 registered and also certified under the Automotive Industry Standard.


Item 3. Legal Proceedings

        We and certain of our subsidiaries, namely Hadco Corporation, or Hadco, and SCI, are involved in various administrative proceedings related to environmental matters. These matters are described in greater detail under "Item 7—Management's Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition and Results of Operations—Factors Affecting Operating Results" and "Item 1—Business—Environmental Controls." Although we could incur significant costs relating to these matters, we believe, based on the limited information that is currently available, that the cost of any remediation that may be required at these facilities would not materially harm our business, financial condition or results of operations.

        SCI was, until earlier this year, a party to an intellectual property dispute in which Gemstar-TV Guide International, Inc., or Gemstar, and StarSight Telecast, Inc., or StarSight, alleged, with respect to SCI, certain violations of the Tariff Act of 1930, including patent infringement, in the importation of set-top multimedia boxes manufactured outside the United States by SCI for EchoStar, another party in the case. This proceeding was filed before the U.S. International Trade Commission, or ITC, in February 2001. Gemstar and StarSight filed a related patent infringement case against SCI in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia in February 2001. A trial at the ITC before an administrative law judge concluded in December 2001. On June 21, 2002, the presiding administrative law judge issued his final initial determination in the proceedings. The judge found that the patent claims in issue were not infringed by the respondents, including SCI, and found no violation by the respondents, including SCI, of the Tariff Act. In July 2002, Gemstar filed a petition for review of the administrative law judge's determinations with the ITC. In August 2002, the ITC upheld the administrative law judge's finding that the respondents, including SCI, had not violated the Tariff Act. Gemstar appealed the ITC's determination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. Oral arguments were heard by the U.S Court of Appeals on October 10, 2003. On March 2, 2004, while the appeal was under submission for decision to the Federal Circuit panel, SCI and EchoStar entered into settlement agreements with Gemstar and StarSight. SCI's settlement with Gemstar and StarSight resulted in a dismissal of all claims against SCI in both the ITC proceeding and the U.S. District Court patent infringement case filed by Gemstar and StarSight.

        During fiscal year 2001, we acquired Segerstrom in a pooling of interests transaction that resulted in the acquisition of approximately 94% of the outstanding shares of Segerstrom. In accordance with Swedish law and business practice, we acquired the remaining 6% of the outstanding shares of Segerstrom through a compulsory acquisition process. During the fourth quarter of fiscal 2004, we concluded a settlement agreement with the remaining 6% shareholders with respect to the purchase price of those shares. A total of $33.8 million was paid to the remaining 6% shareholders.

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        We are a party to certain other legal proceedings that have arisen in the ordinary course of our business. The amounts in dispute in these matters are not material to us, and we believe that the resolution of these proceedings will not have a material adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations.


Item 4. Submission of Matters to a Vote of Security Holders

        None.

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EXECUTIVE OFFICERS OF SANMINA-SCI

        Pursuant to General Instruction G(3), the information regarding Sanmina-SCI's executive officers required by Item 401(b) of Regulation S-K is hereby included in Part I of this report.

        The following table sets forth the name of each executive officer of Sanmina-SCI, the office held by such officer and the age, as of December 10, 2004, of such officer.

Name

  Age
  Position
Jure Sola   53   Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer
Randy W. Furr   50   President, Chief Operating Officer and Director
Hari Pillai   44   President, Global Operations
David L. White   49   Executive Vice President of Finance and Chief Financial Officer
Dennis Young   53   Executive Vice President of Worldwide Sales and Marketing
Steve Bruton   52   President and General Manager, Printed Circuit Board Fabrication Division
Michael Clarke   50   President and General Manager, Enclosures Division

        Jure Sola has served as our chief executive officer since April 1991, as chairman of our board of directors from April 1991 to December 2001 and from December 2002 to present, and co-chairman of our board of directors from December 2001 to December 2002. In 1980, Mr. Sola co-founded Sanmina and initially held the position of vice president of sales. In October 1987, he became vice president and general manager of Sanmina, responsible for manufacturing operations and sales and marketing. In July 1989, Mr. Sola was elected as a director and in October 1989 was appointed as president of Sanmina. In March 1996, Mr. Sola relinquished the title of president when Mr. Furr was appointed to the position.

        Randy W. Furr has served as a director of our company since December 1999 and as our president and chief operating officer since March 1996. In August 1992, Mr. Furr joined our company as vice president and chief financial officer. He also serves as a director of a privately held company. Mr. Furr is a certified public accountant.

        Hari Pillai joined our company in 1994 and has served in manufacturing management positions since that time. In January 2002, Mr. Pillai was appointed president and general manager of the EMS division of our company and in October 2004 was appointed president, global operations.

        David L. White has served as our executive vice president of finance and chief financial officer since August 2004. Prior to joining Sanmina-SCI, he was senior vice president and chief financial officer of Asyst Technologies, a provider of integrated automation solutions that enhance semiconductor and flat-panel display (FPD) manufacturing productivity. Previously, he was president and chief executive officer of Candescent Technologies, a developer of field emission display (FED) technology for next-generation thin FPDs.

        Dennis Young joined our company in March 2003. Prior to joining our company, Mr. Young was senior vice president sales from May 2002 to March 2003 and vice president sales from March 1998 to May 2002 of Pioneer-Standard Electronics.

        Steve Bruton joined our company in 1982 and has served in printed circuit board fabrication management since that time. In December 2001, Mr. Bruton was appointed president and general manager of the printed circuit board fabrication division of our company.

        Michael Clarke joined our company in 1999 as a result of our acquisition of Devtek Electronic Packaging Systems, or Devtek, a manufacturer of electronic and metal components that was established in 1992. Prior to joining our company, Mr. Clarke was president and chief executive officer of Devtek. In December 2001, Mr. Clarke was appointed president and general manager of the enclosures division of our company.

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PART II

Item 5. Market for Registrant's Common Equity and Related Stockholder Matters

Market Information

        Sanmina-SCI's common stock is traded on the Nasdaq National Market under the symbol SANM. The following table lists the high and low intra-day prices for Sanmina-SCI's common stock as reported on Nasdaq.

Fiscal 2004

  High
  Low
First quarter   $ 12.65   $ 9.11
Second quarter   $ 15.51   $ 10.19
Third quarter   $ 12.03   $ 8.65
Fourth quarter   $ 9.20   $ 6.30
Fiscal 2003

  High
  Low
First quarter  </