Lovoltech website

Just for giggles, I tried to get to the datasheet by going through the main site and found that it's a "you can't get there from here" situation. Clicking on "All Products" brings up a diode...only. Nothing else. Clicking on "Technical Information" doesn't work either--you get more diodes.

Grey
 
And they list 10 Sales offices in China/Taiwan (but the Chinese language option runs into the voids), plus two in Korea, and themselves for USA. Rest of the World: Nada. Shows their priorities, or they even might have been sort of "taken over", just look the names at the contact page, or here:
http://investing.businessweek.com/research/stocks/private/snapshot.asp?privcapId=738277

Looks like another FET resource dying...

- Klaus
 
They were unapologetic about their primary business focus when I talked to them way back when. The lion's share of the JFETs went to PC manufacturers in Asia. In that sense, there's no change.
At one point they had listed the power JFETs as being used in this, that, and the other thing...and in high end audio amplification. This gave me a case of the giggles because as far as I know, Nelson and I were the only ones who ever bought from them with that in mind.

Grey
 
> They were unapologetic about their primary business focus when I talked to them way back when.

Why should they ?

Semiconductor companies only exist to make money. And you don't make money supplying the "DIY Community".

It is totally understandable, however inconvenient, that the likes of Toshiba & Vishay stop producing JFETs one day, because they just don't bring enough revenue for the effort. Even if they were to sell direct for US$5 a piece, there is just not enough volume. You don't sell 100k 2SK389s a year !! They rather use the energy to make memory chips or what not with high volume.

Unfortunate for us, of course !!!!


Patrick
 
It's not that they don't support audio, it's that they appear to be backing away from the power JFETs; which were designed for PC power supplies. We were accidental beneficiaries, true, but even the PC makers will be caught if they discontinue the power JFETs.
The deduction is that the power JFETs are not selling well, even to PC manufacturers.

Grey
 
The one and only
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EUVL said:
> Even if they were to sell direct for US$5 a piece, there is just not enough volume. You don't sell 100k 2SK389s a year !!

Actually, It's likely that you do. I doubt that 100K is adequate
to motivate Toshiba. Even a much smaller outfit like Qspeed
does not seem to have an interest in 100K annual quantities
when they consider the cost of development.