Inside IPC: How Government Relations and Industry Intelligence Help Shape the Electronics Industry

The global electronics industry stands at a crossroads of political uncertainty and economic volatility. Few understand this challenging landscape better than Chris Mitchell, Vice President of Government Relations at IPC, who shared valuable insights with me during this candid conversation recorded at APEX 2025.

Chris, who oversees both government relations and industry intelligence programs, reveals how IPC has strategically expanded its global footprint to better serve members navigating complexity. With dedicated representatives now covering North America, Europe, and soon Asia, the organization provides crucial intelligence that helps companies make confident decisions despite market turbulence. As Chris observes, "Companies are looking for clarity," which explains why many have temporarily paused investments and expansion while awaiting greater certainty.

The political dimension looms large throughout our discussion. Chris offers a sobering assessment that volatility will likely continue for six to nine months as the US administration reshapes its approach to domestic governance and international relationships. Yet he remains optimistic that opportunities will emerge once the situation stabilizes. Meanwhile, in Europe, IPC focuses on revitalizing weak industry segments by helping policymakers recognize and address fundamental challenges.

What truly distinguishes IPC is its evolution into a respected global authority through strategic investment in expertise. The organization has assembled an impressive internal team including chief economist Shawn Dubravac, sustainability leader Kelly Scanlon, and engineering specialist Matt Kelly. Together, they transform overwhelming amounts of data into actionable insights, particularly valuable for companies evaluating supply chain diversification or new investment locations. As Chris notes, the challenge isn't just having data—it's having quality data delivered with meaningful context.

EMS@C-Level Live at APEX is sponsored by global inspection leaders Koh Young (https://www.kohyoung.com) and Creative Electron (https://creativeelectron.com)

EMS@C-Level is hosted by global inspection leaders Koh Young (https://www.kohyoung.com) and Global Electronics Association (https://www.electronics.org)

You can see video versions of all of the EMS@C-Level pods on our YouTube playlist.

Transcript

Meeting Chris Mitchell at APEX 2025

Philip Stoten 0:08

Hello, I'm Philip Stoughton. I'm at APEX 2025 on the final day. My penultimate interview is with Chris Mitchell from IPT. Chris, great to see you, good to chat, as always. I talked to Alison about what's going on in Europe. I talked to Rich about what's going on here. I talked to Alison about what's going on in Europe, I talked to Rich about what's going on here, and I've talked to a lot of EMS companies throughout this week. They're all looking for stability, they're all looking for an outcome. They're all figuring out how to navigate these choppy waters without creating too much of a pause in their business. The fact that you're able to bring those global views together is hugely valuable.

Global Government Relations Expansion

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 0:47

I think so. I mean we certainly in this environment. I think companies are looking for clarity yeah, clearly right. And to the degree that we have an ability to understand how governments are thinking about these issues globally, it does provide us this opportunity to provide insight to our members, and I think that's what we've been striving to do and certainly, I think what Allison and Rich have been really primarily focused on during this period of quite a bit of volatility.

Philip Stoten 1:16

Yeah, and you have other teams elsewhere in the world. You have people in India, you have other activities that are actually bringing a really important global picture, or at least globally wherever electronics is.

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 1:30

Absolutely. So you know, I oversee our government relations program as well as our industry intelligence program, and these are two programs that over the last 10 years have been growing, and so, you know, today we not only have government relations coverage globally, we are expanding that government relations team. So now we have a lead for North American government relations, we just brought somebody on in Europe and we're expanding into Asia as well, and so, again, I think it's just during this period of volatility being able to access data points being able to understand the lay of the land so that you could make decisions with some greater confidence, and I think what we've seen thus far is a lot of companies just taking a pause until they get the clarity that they need.

Philip Stoten 2:17

Yeah, and I was asking Rich when that clarity is coming. Obviously we hope April will show us a bit more clarity, but who knows? It's a fast-mo moving world at the moment.

Political Volatility and Economic Impact

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 2:29

Yeah, you know, I mean, this is just my personal opinion especially in the US. I think what you're going to see is you're going to see, you know, this next six to nine months, there's going to continue to be volatility and a lot of questions, as the administration kind of seeks to take advantage of this momentum that they have to refashion government in the way that they like to be able to challenge some of the existing bilateral multilateral relationships in the way that they would like to, and so I think you're going to continue to see that. I think, over some period of time, though, it's going to start to settle, yeah, and as they feel that they are in a better position then to rebuild in a way that is consistent with the agenda that they brought into office, then I think that's when you'll start to see things calm down a little bit and then you'll start to see a more positive, proactive agenda.

Philip Stoten 3:18

Um, and I, and I think that that's where there will be the greatest opportunities for for the industry yeah yeah, and I think behind the political discussion that I'm having I've not talked about politics at a trade show so much before, so it's it's it's kind of a key topic but behind that is the is the economic impact. So when we look at the US, concerns about a recession have been here for like the last two years and it's like the recession that's around the corner that we never seem to get to, and the fact that we never get there is a good thing. In Europe we have a new government. In Germany we have a substantial raising of debt ceilings, a lot of budget increases in the defense area, so all of those things are really important topics for the industry on both sides of the Atlantic. Being across that is hugely valuable to them and the way you share that information with them adds a lot of value to them making better decisions.

European Industry Revitalization Efforts

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 4:17

But it is interesting, though, on one hand, I think we should rightly be seen as global and the perspective that we bring to supporting the industry is global In a very real way, a lot of our work is very local too. So when I think about the work that Alison is undertaking in Europe, that work is being driven by our European members. Yeah, absolutely, and so you know, obviously we take a lot of pride in that. But again, you know, because we are member driven, we need to make sure that we are connecting with the members where they are, and those members are really. They are setting the direction for us. Yeah, absolutely, and certainly. I think that's reflected in the reports that we've put out recently and the work that we'll continue to do. Right, so in Europe, we see really incredible opportunity to help to revitalize the industry. I mean, it's still, as you know, many segments are struggling.

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 5:14

And so we need to figure out how do we revitalize the industry. And you know, I do believe that in Europe we have been successful in getting policymakers to understand that there is a problem that needs to be addressed. Now, have they figured out how to address the problem yet? No, have we been giving them a lot of suggestions? Absolutely. There's still a lot more work to do, but I feel like we're making progress and certainly given the changing geopolitical environment, it certainly is even more incentive to try to tackle these problems in Europe.

Evolving Industry Intelligence Services

Philip Stoten 5:50

Yeah, absolutely. It does feel like there's a bit of a renegotiation in the European-US relationship. It'll be interesting to see how that plays out. Throughout the year, I didn't realize that market intelligence and industry intelligence was also your remit, but it makes perfect sense and when I think of the whole ecosystem, I think this is one of the reasons IPC is so strong. With that market intelligence, you can do a much better job of advocacy, but you can also do a much better job of, with both of those bits of data, of helping companies make better decisions.

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 6:25

And if you look at the direction of our industry intelligence, I think that's where it is increasingly focused, right, how do you make, how do you help companies make, business decisions based upon the data points that are out there? A lot of what we're focused on is how do you pull in ever more data and be able to offer this data to the industry in ways that are both packaged and unpackaged so that they can make those decisions, and I think this is especially important in places as companies hedge, diversify their supply chains. They're looking for new places to invest, and there's always questions about well, you know what does the outlook look like, you know what are the costs, and so I think we have a valuable role to play, and I think that's what the industry intelligence team right now is more and more focused on.

Philip Stoten 7:16

Yeah, and I think moving that industry intelligence forward I think is really important. We've got some reports in the industry that have been the same for 20 years. They're very dry, they're very kind of intense.

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 7:28

They really offer data rather than insight, and actually being able to put that layer of insight because you're bringing everything together and synthesizing it, that could be a game changer for the industry Well, and, as you know, we have, over the last, I'd say, five to six years, increasingly brought greater authority within our organization, and so it's not just on the industry intelligence side, with people like Sean Dubervac, our chief economist, but it's elsewhere in the organization Kelly Scanlon, who leads our sustainability initiative and has been hugely important in helping to set priorities for the industry.

Building Trust Through Quality Data

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 8:08

You know Matt Kelly, of course, who, and you know, he's been building out what is, in effect, an internal engineering team within IPC. That's really exciting, yeah, and while a lot of you know the attention is being paid to the work that they're doing on the projects that, for example, the solutions team has identified, it also contributes to the industry intelligence right. So I would say, while we have an industry intelligence team that is perhaps on paper, small, it's really figuring out how does that industry intelligence team leverage insight across the organization and even outside of the organization. So that's been very exciting to see it grow and evolve.

Philip Stoten 8:51

And I think people really want to see data that's accurate, data that's timely and data that's delivered in a way that helps them. And it's kind of curious because that's exactly what they're looking for from their equipment, from their production line. You know, when they look at all this AI modeling that they can do on top of things, if the data is not right, they're not off to the races.

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 9:14

Well, it's a bit ironic, right? I feel like more and more there is. We are deluged with data, and the question is how good is that data? Yeah, absolutely. And to what degree can you make sense of it? Yeah, right, and so that's what we're trying to do is trying to make sure that we have really solid data that we're working with, and then that we're, as you said, leveraging that data to offer real insight about what's happening in the industry.

Philip Stoten 9:35

Yeah, and I think the good thing, chris, is IPC is seen as a trusted authority, so if you're putting that together and you're delivering that to the market, the market will trust that, and I think that's important, chris, always a pleasure to chat, always Love the work you're doing on the politics side, but also really appreciate the data as well.

Chris Mitchell, Vice President, Global Government Relations at IPC 9:54

Great. Thank you so much, thanks so much.