Brussels, 29/05/2002 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission has given the go-ahead for Sanmina-SCI (US) to buy up Hewlett-Packard's manufacturing operations near Lyons in France. Sanmina-SCI is a diversified provider of electronics manufacturing services (EMS) to original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) in the electronic industry, while HP France supplies a wide range of electronic equipment. During its investigation, the Commission found there were a number of strong competitors providing EMS to OEMs in the IT sector, such as Solectron, Flextronics, Celestica and Jabil. As regards outsourcing, OEMs tend to work with several EMS providers at the same time on short project contracts which can usually be terminated at relatively short notice. These factors are significant competitive constraints on the new entity and allowed the Commission to clear the deal.