In 2025, Amphenol reported annual revenue of $23.1 billion, a 52% year-on-year increase – representing an organic growth rate of 38% even excluding acquisition impacts. That same year, it completed five acquisitions and finalized its landmark $10.5 billion deal to acquire CommScope’s CCS division in early 2026.
Meanwhile, TE Connectivity announced this year that it would acquire power management company Astrodyne TDI for approximately $1.4 billion; Molex, on the other hand, secured consecutive deals with Smiths Interconnect and Teramount.
And what they’re buying isn’t the same thing.
Amphenol is strengthening its presence in fiber optics and military interconnects; TE is expanding into power management and automotive charging interfaces; while Molex is reinforcing high-reliability connectivity while betting big on CPO and silicon photonics.
The competition among these connector titans has moved beyond mere comparisons of individual connector components, evolving into a contest of integrated interconnect system solutions powered by multiple technologies.
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Strong Organic Growth
Why Are They Still Aggressively Acquiring?
Amphenol is the most typical example.
In Q2 2026, the company reported sales of $8.758 billion, up 55% year-on-year, with organic growth still reaching 30%. Orders reached $10.7 billion, resulting in a book-to-bill ratio of 1.23.
Rather than using acquisitions to mask weak organic growth, Amphenol actively treats M&A as a strategic tool for expansion.
Adam Norwitt, CEO of Amphenol, stated during the earnings call that acquisition is at the core of the company’s growth strategy. The interconnected industry market exceeds $250 billion and remains highly fragmented, leaving substantial room for future growth through mergers and acquisitions.
The global connector market was approximately $75 billion in 2025 and is projected to reach $109.1 billion by 2035, with a compound annual growth rate of about 3.7%. This means the industry is still growing overall, but not all companies can easily achieve rapid growth.
Especially as AI data centers, electric vehicles, industrial automation, and defense aerospace rapidly evolve, customers no longer just want connectors.
Previously, they bought connectors; now, more and more projects require integrated solutions combining copper connectivity, optical connectivity, cables, power supplies, and components.
Developing, certifying, and introducing all these capabilities from scratch would take too long. Thus, acquisitions have become the fastest way for industry giants to expand.
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While All Three Giants Are Buying, Their Acquisition Strategies Differ Significantly
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Amphenol: Expanding Its Interconnect Footprint
The $10.5 billion acquisition of CommScope’s CCS marks the largest transaction in Amphenol’s history.
CCS is projected to generate approximately $3.6 billion in sales and a 26% EBITDA margin by 2025, with operations focused on data center fiber interconnects and communication networks.
For Amphenol, the most significant aspect of this deal lies in further strengthening its fiber interconnect capabilities – extending from copper to optical connectivity and evolving from individual connectors to complete end-to-end links.
Yet Amphenol isn’t betting solely on AI: its roughly $1 billion acquisition of Trexon targets the defense market with high-reliability connectors and cable assemblies, while Narda-MITEQ specializes in active RF interconnect solutions for defense applications.
Thus, Amphenol’s true strategy is clear: wherever there are high-growth, high-barrier interconnect markets, it will continue expanding its footprint.
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TE: Expanding from “Connectivity” to “Power”
This year, TE acquired Astrodyne TDI for approximately $1.4 billion. The latter specializes in advanced power management and filtering solutions, with annual sales exceeding $250 million. This acquisition raises an interesting question: why is a connector giant now buying a power company?
Because in AI data centers, industrial systems, and energy infrastructure, customers are increasingly concerned not only with “how signals are connected,” but also with “how power is delivered” and “how power is managed.”
TE is extending its business boundaries beyond merely connecting signals and electricity—now moving further into managing power itself.
Additionally, TE has acquired Phoenix Contact’s automotive charging interface business within its E-Mobility division, further strengthening its portfolio of European automotive charging products.
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Molex: Betting on Next-Generation Optical Interconnects
This year, Molex completed its acquisition of Smiths Interconnect, further strengthening its high-reliability connectivity capabilities in aerospace, defense, medical, and semiconductor testing.
Another move – Teramount – is clearly more forward-looking.
Teramount’s core technology is fiber-to-chip, addressing how to efficiently connect optical fibers to silicon photonics chips, directly targeting CPO and other silicon photonics applications. What Molex sees is not Teramount’s current revenue, but rather the potential that if CPO truly scales into mass production within AI data centers, the connection between fiber and chip could become a critical strategic point for next-generation interconnects.
Amphenol is expanding its platform, TE is extending its supply chain, while Molex is proactively betting on future technology paths.
Though their approaches differ, all three companies are moving in the same direction: connector manufacturers are continuously pushing the boundaries of their business outward.
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What the giants really want to buy
are actually four things
When you break down these deals, what’s being acquired for hundreds of billions of dollars ultimately boils down to just four elements.
Buying time: In markets such as automotive, defense, and data centers, the real challenge isn’t developing products – it’s gaining customer certification and entering supply chains. While building in-house is possible, it’s too slow. Acquiring a company that has already passed validation and entered the client ecosystem is equivalent to purchasing several years of time directly.
Buying technology: Power management from Astrodyne, optical coupling from Teramount, fiber interconnects from CCS – these are capabilities traditional connector companies would struggle to develop quickly on their own. Compared to building teams from scratch, acquisition is far faster.
Buying customer access: Defense, automotive OEMs, and hyperscale data centers all have high supplier entry barriers. Therefore, a company’s value extends beyond revenue and profit—it includes established customer relationships. For acquirers, buying a company means also acquiring an instant ticket into its customer base.
Buying market boundaries: Amphenol moving from copper to optical connectivity; TE expanding from connectors into power management; Molex entering optical interconnects near chips. This is the deepest shift behind this wave of mergers and acquisitions: connector companies are transforming from “component manufacturers” into “connection technology platforms.”
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After the funds are disbursed,
mergers and acquisitions still face three major practical challenges
M&A is a proactive strategic choice for companies, aiming for mutual synergy and shared success. However, completing an acquisition does not guarantee value realization – numerous real-world challenges remain.
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First, the challenge of value realization
Amphenol’s acquisition of CCS cost $10.5 billion. Based on its projected 2025 revenue of $3.6 billion and a rough EBITDA margin of 26%, the transaction implies a valuation of approximately 11 times EBITDA, placing the acquisition cost at a relatively high level. Whether this deal delivers value depends on CCS’s ability to sustain growth and achieve business synergies with Amphenol.
Domestic companies also face similar challenges in realizing valuation. In 2025, Shiny Electronics acquired 80% of Guolian Electronics for 220 million yuan, with part of the purchase price contingent on performance targets achieved between 2025 and 2027. While an initially high acquisition price is not necessarily fatal, the real risk lies in the target company’s future profitability failing to meet the valuation expectations at the time of acquisition.
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Second, challenges in implementing the technology roadmap.
The acquisition of Teramount represents a forward-looking strategic move targeting CPO and silicon photonics. However, transitioning new technologies from the lab to large-scale mass production requires simultaneously overcoming multiple hurdles, including cost, reliability, industry standards, and customer adoption. If the industrialization of CPO progresses slower than expected, the corresponding investment return cycle will also be extended. Technological mergers and acquisitions are essentially strategic bets on future industry directions, inherently involving uncertainty during the process of technology commercialization.
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Third, integration challenges after acquisition
This is often the most underestimated aspect of mergers and acquisitions. Yang Xuying, head of the investment department at Zhucheng Technology, told reporters that the biggest challenge in M&A is cultural integration: “Many acquisition targets appear to be complementary, but ultimately fail due to incompatible cultures, leading to separation again.”
Whether products can achieve synergy, customer resources can be effectively shared, core teams remain stable, and management systems can smoothly integrate will directly determine the final success of an acquisition.
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Will Chinese connector companies experience their own wave of mergers and acquisitions?
By acquiring Ruisong Electronics, Zhucheng Technology increased its stake to 60%, further expanding into communication and data center connector markets.
Meanwhile, Shinyen Electronics entered the high-speed, high-frequency connectors for new-energy vehicles by acquiring Guolian Electronics, starting from consumer electronics connectors.
Hualing Cable’s acquisition of Anhui Sanzhu extended its business from specialty cables into industrial connectors, servo systems, and robotics.
An industry insider who requested anonymity noted that domestic connector companies face severe low-end, homogenized competition. For leading players, cross-sector expansion through M&A and filling gaps in high-end production capacity is an inevitable trend. The pace of industry consolidation will only accelerate.
These cases send a clear signal: domestic integration has already begun.
Li Yiping, president of the Shenzhen Connector Association, believes that intense homogenization in China’s connector industry makes higher concentration an inevitable trend, with market share gradually consolidating among a few major players.
However, challenges remain evident in domestic M&A activities. Beyond common issues such as raw material price fluctuations affecting gross margins and valuation difficulties, post-merger integration capabilities are generally lacking among Chinese firms. Cultural alignment, management integration, and supply chain coordination are all significant hurdles.
Policy support is also emerging. The 2026 government work report proposed establishing a “green channel” for listing financing and merger and acquisition restructuring for technology enterprises in key core technology fields. Meanwhile, the National Development and Reform Commission announced plans to promote the establishment of national-level M&A funds, expected to leverage over 1 trillion yuan in total capital.
Conclusion
Global giants have proven that mergers and acquisitions can quickly fill technological gaps, acquire customers, and expand markets.
However, what domestic companies should truly learn is not how many companies Amphenol acquires in a year, but rather: why they acquire, what they acquire, and how they create synergy after the acquisition.
AI is accelerating the platformization of the connector industry, but ultimately, it’s strategic insight and integration capability that determine how far a company can go.
Spending money is only the first step; turning acquired companies into one’s own muscle is the real test.