Rick Smith is vice president of business development at ERAI, an organization founded in 1995 as a watchdog for the electronic component distribution section, aiming to combat bad business practices and counterfeiting. Rick definitely has some stories to tell about the hows and whys of counterfeiting, and breaks down some compelling numbers when it comes to fake parts being sold into the open market.

No matter how many times I visit potential customers, I never tire of giving them advice on global sourcing. It also never surprises me that they usually know very little about the subject. They think they do, but once we discuss the idea of buying products offshore, they have many misconceptions. This made me think that there needs to be some sort of primer or a set of guidelines on the subject.

Tim Burke, CTO and co-founder of Arch Systems, is presenting a new course through IPC, AI Applications of Machine Data in the EMS Industry. These topics—AI, machine learning, and Connected Factory Exchange (CFX)—are top of mind in the industry, and in this interview, Tim shares insights into how his company helps customers leverage machine data analytics to enhance manufacturing efficiencies and the tremendously important role of AI, which is making more meaningful data aggregation and its usage significantly easier for everyone.