Solectron's first customer designed and distributed an electronic controller for solar energy equipment.

[5] Solectron was established in 1977 to provide outsourced manufacturing services to third parties.

Solectron founders Roy Kusumoto and Prabhat Jain saw a growing number of electronics companies in California's Silicon Valley.

There was a need to provide printed circuit board assembly (PCBA) services, handling the manufacturing overflow from OEMs.

Solectron aimed to provide high-tech companies the ability for their products to be produced and delivered more quickly and efficiently than their competition, and believed that their customers needed a greater level of service for assembly and manufacture of printed circuit boards, cellular phones, along the entire product supply chain.