Circuits Assembly Online Magazine - Features

WASHINGTON -- The National Association of Manufacturers expressed disappointment today with the Treasury Department's failure to cite China for currency manipulation in its semiannual report to Congress, but noted Treasury's statement that time is running out for China to act.

NAM president John Engler released a statement saying, "We have called for Treasury to cite China for currency manipulation in its report, and of course we are disappointed that did not happen."

But Engler pointed to a statement by Snow during a Treasury news conference this afternoon warning China that, "If current trends continue without substantial alteration, China's policies will likely meet the statute's technical requirements for designation" as a currency manipulator.

PHOENIX -- Hurt by the loss of a key customer, Suntron Corp., a provider of electronics manufacturing services, today reported a net loss of $6.2 million as net sales slipped 18% to $82.7 million in its fiscal first quarter.

The results include $400,000 of restructuring charges related to severance, retention and lease exit costs.

Sequentially, net sales decreased $33.1 million, or 29%.

The decline was primarily due to the loss of Applied Materials, Suntron said.

SAN JOSE -- Michael E. Marks will step down early next year as chief executive of Flextronics International Ltd. He will be replaced by Michael McNamara, the company's chief operating officer.

Marks told analysts in San Francisco on Thursday that he will become chairman of the company on Jan. 31, 2006.

Flextronics, the world's largest EMS provider, also announced several charges associated with restructuring and refinancing the balance sheet.

TORONTO -- SMTC Corp., a global electronics manufacturing services provider, today reported revenue of $49.1 million for the first quarter ended April 3, up 2% from last quarter but down from $69.4 million a year ago.

The net loss was $2.6 million, compared with a net loss of $3.2 million sequentially and a net loss of $47,000 last year.

Gross profit was $2 million, or 4.1% of revenue, compared with $1.5 million, or 3.1% of revenue, for the previous quarter and $6.8 million (9.9% of revenue) for the first quarter 2004. Gross profit was affected by higher costs for training and resource retention as well as freight costs for transferring certain programs to the company's Mexico facility.

In a press release, John Caldwell, president and chief executive, said, "Although overall first quarter results remain below satisfactory levels, the company achieved modest revenue growth in what we believe is a typically soft quarter. Importantly, in the quarter SMTC added several new customers as well as gained a number of new program wins with current customers."

MINNEAPOLIS, MN—SMTA International, co-located with the Assembly Tech Expo (ATExpo) show at the Donald Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont, IL from Sept. 25-29, will feature many events concentrating on lead-free soldering technology and environmental compliance issues.

Courses will be held on the following lead-free topics:

- Lead-free Manufacturing

- Lead-free Troubleshooting

- Lead-free Wave Soldering Process Troubleshooting

- Lead-free Inspection, Process Control and Defect Elimination

- Lead-free Rework

- Lead-free Reliability

- Lead-free Solder Joint Reliability

- Lead-free Surface Finishes and Compatibility with Lead-free Soldering

- Lead-free System Compatibility - Materials and Processes

- A - Z of Lead-free Soldering Master Class

- DFM: Surface Mount PCB Design Guidelines and Lead-free Assembly Process

Development

- Tin Whiskers: Historical Prospective, Test Method, Mechanisms, Reduction

and Elimination

- RoHS 101 and Lead-free Surface Mount Assembly

Almost 60 technical paper sessions will cover lead-free reflow and wave soldering, rework, key issues in lead-free/RoHS manufacturing, lead-free CSP reliability, HASL surface finishes, effects on PCBs, surface finishes, process control and RoHS test methods and compliance, customer and industry requirements, and due diligence approach to WEEE/RoHS compliance.

In addition, the Lead-free Soldering Symposium will consist of technical sessions organized by the Joint Council on Aging Aircraft / Joint Group on Pollution Prevention

(JCAA/JCPP) Lead-free Solder Consortia Project, as well as sessions on Process for Lead-free Implementation and Lead-free Reliability. It will provide the latest information on materials selections, lead-free processing techniques, and critical aspects of lead-free interconnection reliability, including backward/forward compatibility, moisture-level effects and failure analysis techniques.

Additional events include two lead-free panel discussions, a half-day workshop on Lead-free Reflow Soldering Using Convection Dominant Ovens, the opening ceremony on RoHS Compliance and Solder Trends and the SMTA Annual Meeting keynote on "The Impact of Temperature on Hybrid and Compliant Assemblies" by Dan Shea, CTO of Celestica.

Jena, Germany - More than 80 visitors attended the Boundary Scan Days event on May 3-4 sponsored by GÖPEL electronic GmbH (a 50% increase over last year's attendance). According to the company, the presentation of the new Boundary Scan hardware architecture SCANFLEX produced high interest among the attendees.

Many known Boundary Scan users, ATE vendors and chip manufacturers attended, including Siemens, Diehl Avionik, Phoenix Contact, National Semiconductor and Digitaltest. The companies discussed applications, test support and problem solving issues.

Previous Boundary Scan Days were held in Switzerland and Scandinavia, and they will also take place in Italy, the Benelux countries, France, Great Britain, the U.S. and Canada.