Granted, there's uncertainty in telecom, and you'll find most CEOs hesitant to discuss the outlook for the next quarter, let alone the next year. Sift the available data, though, and you'll find that even the most pessimistic scenarios see telecom no worse than flat through 2003. That still represents a multibillion-dollar power-source arena to divvy up.

One thing all dc/dc participants agree on: They need to be aggressive in securing greater market share during the downturn. That's done by providing better products and overall service, and by establishing a favorable position from which to spring when the business comes back. That implies having as much capability in-house as possible, from basic design to thermal and mechanical analysis capability to getting UL approvals in a hurry. In-house capability pares down the middlemen and focuses on close customer support to ensure products get to market and work exactly as planned the first time. That's especially important in rough times, when OEMs become even more selective in choosing suppliers.

Will there be a supplier fallout? Opinions vary, and lie largely along the lines of big-company vs. small-company philosophies. But smaller doesn't mean inferior. "Smaller and newer companies tend to be more innovative and to have more focus, and they can be very nimble," Mohan Mankikar, president of power supply market watcher MicroTech Consultants, told me in a recent interview. "Smaller companies tend to have smaller overhead and can often better survive."

Even then, he says, the issue isn't the size of the company per se but the ability to manage the business successfully.

But that seems to be more of a challenge with larger company infrastructures.

In any case, the market will be "very dynamic" next year, Mankikar said, and the key will be introducing better products.

To me, "better," by necessity, will come to mean products that stand out in ways we don't know yet.