Device Manager

Covid-19 tore the world’s tech supply chains asunder, the effects of which are still being felt today. But through steady management and quality of work, malaysian component manufacturer analog devices has managed to thrive during the storm.

- Michael Wayne

COMPANY : Analog Devices

LOCATION : Penang, Malaysia

Behind every electronic marvel of the modern age, there are myriad unsung innovators, manufacturers and suppliers who come together to make things work. These are the companies that are in more households than the household names. As electronic equipment becomes more and more sophisticated, the amount of proprietary hardware inside them grows. Your iPhone’s camera comes from one place, its OLED screen another.

This makes our everyday gadgets into veritable Trojan horses, secreting the hard work of these behind-the-scenes players into our homes with increasing regularity. It sounds more sinister than it is, however; the big companies can’t do it all, and that’s when they turn to innovators such as Analog Devices.

During World War II, the need to one-up the enemy on the battlefield manifested itself in dramatic technological leaps. Radar, for instance, is widely credited as being a crucial piece of the Allied victory. When the war ended, technological development had built up too much momentum, leading to an explosion of consumer electronics based on wartime advancements. And so it was that a pair of MIT graduates who specialised in gyroscopic instrumentation formed their own company, Analog Devices, in 1965. The company initially manufactured and sold operational amplifiers and soon branched out into digital-to-analog converters and semiconductors.