Circuits Assembly Online Magazine - Features

The National Electronics Manufacturing Initiative (NEMI, Herndon, VA) has issued a set of interim recommendations for lead-free component finishes to be used in high-reliability electronic applications to minimize the risk of failures caused by tin whiskers. These recommendations were developed by the consortium's Tin Whisker User Group, comprised of nine large manufacturers of high-reliability electronic assemblies that annually purchase millions of dollars of components.

The group was organized to define methods and tests that would minimize the probability of tin whiskers creating functional or reliability problems in their products. Members include Alcatel, Celestica, Cisco Systems, Delphi Electronics, HP, IBM, Lucent Technologies, Sun Microsystems and Tyco Electronics. The group consensus is that pure tin electroplating presents a risk in high-reliability applications, and they have outlined cost-effective alternatives—using known mitigation practices and some level of testing—to minimize this risk.

This second interim report updates a report published by the group in June 2003 and presents recommendations for lead-free finishes for a variety of applications. These recommendations reflect the best judgment of the group members, based on their own experiences and the available data. The document outlines specific whisker mitigation guidelines supported by the group.

The document also discusses specific component types, assessing the reliability risk of tin whiskers for each and the various mitigation strategies recommended. The group is currently in the process of extending this work to create a user acceptance specification based on the test methods defined by the NEMI Tin Whisker Accelerated Test Project.

The Tin Whisker User Group's recommendations are available at: http://www.nemi.org/projects/ese/tin_whisker_usergroup.html.

Data I/O Corp. (Redmond, WA), a provider of manual and automated programming systems, announced high volume programming support for Texas Instruments' (TI, Dallas, TX) TMS320F2810 digital signal controller on its Sprint family of device programmers. With this support, TI's automotive, white goods and industrial customers have a programming solution for the flash-based F2810 controller along with the already supported TMS320F2812 controller.

Jennifer Skinner-Gray, TMS320C2000T marketing manager, Texas Instruments, said, "TI continues to work closely with Data I/O to assure that our customers using Data I/O manual and automated programming systems have volume programming support for new C2000 controllers as they become available."

The 32-bit digital signal controllers are digital signal processing (DSP)-based cores optimized for control applications that require the peripheral set and ease-of-use of a microcontroller (MCU). The result is a highly integrated system on chip (SoC)-like device that is able to handle control system processing requirements, as well as replace control system host MCUs.

"We are pleased to announce this support for the F2810," said Bruce Rodgers, Data I/O Director of Semiconductor Relations & Marketing. "The automotive market is an important customer group for our company, and we expect many users will embrace this family of TI devices for their range of applications."

www.dataio.com

www.ti.com

According to IPC (Northbrook, IL), the North American interconnect manufacturing services (IMS)/ printed circuit board (PCB) industry book-to-bill ratio for February remained firm at 1.08. The ratio is calculated by averaging the index numbers for orders booked over the past three months and dividing by the average index numbers for sales billed during the same period. A ratio of more than 1.00 suggests that current demand is ahead of supply, which indicates probable near-term growth.

Shipments in February increased 27.5% year-on-year, while orders booked increased 42%. Shipments of PCBs are up 27.9% year-to-date, with bookings up 30.9%.

The February shipment index was 131.4, up 11.3% from January, and the booking index was 144.4, up 15.3%..

The index shows how current PCB shipments and bookings relate to an index point. In this case, 1992 was chosen as the index point because it was a stable growth year for U.S. PCB manufacturers. A shipment index number of 117.0, for example, indicates that shipments are 17% higher than average shipments for the same time period in 1992.

Survey participants report shipments have increased 28.6% year-to date and bookings have increased 33.6%.

The information in IPC's monthly industry statistics is based on data provided by PCB manufacturers that participate in the IMS Statistical Program. These companies represent approximately 60% of the U.S. IMS industry.

www.ipc.org

Tecnomatix Technologies Ltd. (Herzlia, Israel), a provider of manufacturing process management (MPM), announced that Bosch Security Systems Ltd. has selected eMPower solutions from Tecnomatix Unicam for its manufacturing site in China. Tecnomatix Unicam is a wholly owned subsidiary of Tecnomatix Technologies.

The solutions—including eM-Assembly Expert and eM-Test Expert—will help the company facilitate machine setup and reduce the impact of product changeover in the company's high-mix, low-volume manufacturing environment. Eventually, Bosch plans to extend the application to the shop floors as well. This initiative will begin with the Bosch Security Systems facility in Zhuhai, South China.

Tecnomatix Technologies Ltd. also predicted that sales will rise by 15 to 20% in 2005 on top of the 15% growth projected for 2004, helped by higher demand from manufacturers and cost-cutting efforts.

Tecnomatix, a provider of robotic simulation and engineering software, has weathered a three-year slump by reducing 25% of its work force. Demand started to pick up in the December quarter, as it signed a $50 million contract with a major U.S. automotive maker.

In 2003, the company posted revenue of $86.3 million and a loss of $10.3 million.

The bulk of Tecnomatix's revenue comes from Europe and North America. It is expanding rapidly in China, where it faces the double-edged sword of surging demand and rampant piracy.

www.tecnomatix.com

Digi-Key Corp. (Thief River Falls, MN) and AVX (Myrtle Beach, SC) have signed a global agreement allowing Digi-Key to distribute AVX products. For AVX, Digi-Key will serve as a channel partner, managing an extensive customer base that includes technology leaders as well as small and emerging customers. AVX will enhance Digi-Key's product offering in a variety of categories allowing customers more choices in component technology.

Mark Larson, president of Digi-Key, said, "Digi-Key's ability to provide off-the-shelf delivery on a broad range of AVX components for both prototype and production needs should translate into a real advantage for Digi-Key's customers."

AVX capacitor products are widely used and Digi-Key meets the specific demands of this important area of the electronics market. Digi-Key offers a variety of standard AVX capacitors, oscillators, varistors and interconnect, as well as more innovative products like the OxiCap, which is a low voltage, non-burn capacitor, ideal for replacing surface-mount device (SMD) aluminum electrolytics.

Digi-Key is a full service provider of prototype/design as well as production volume quantities of electronic components.

Serving a broad range of markets including: telecommunications, data processing, automotive, consumer and medical sectors, AVX serves the passive electronic component and interconnect products industries.

www.digikey.com

www.avxcorp.com

phoenix|x-ray Systems + Services Inc. (Camarillo, CA) has introduced the nanome|x, a high-powered nanofocus four-in-one failure analysis system. The x-ray inspection and failure analysis system can perform sophisticated nondestructive testing processes and resolve minute details. The system is designed to meet manufacturers' requirements of complex semiconductor devices and highly integrated electronic assemblies, yet can be used in the field of micromechanics and material testing as well.

The design is a result of a close partnership with its customers across several fields of applications. As a result, the system uses a high-powered nanofocus tube that can be operated in four modes covering the range from nanometer resolution to high-power radiation. Users can resolve an extreme level of detail (200-300 nm or 0.2-0.3 microns), displaying the slightest defect in miniaturized assemblies, such as pad wetting failures in flip chip solder joints or cracks in bond wires with verifiable results.

The same tube is infinitely variable up to 160kV and can also power up to 50W to see through highly absorbent materials like tungsten alloys used in IC packages or injector nozzles or microelectromechanical systems (MEMS).

The system deploys the company's ovhm|module technology that, without rotation of the board and thus loss of magnification in the oblique, allows for a high magnification (2000x) and 3-D-like imagery with 2-D magnification acquisition speeds. The tube and detector rotate up to 70° around the sample while providing the needed oblique view necessary to see minute defects in small solder joints found in fine-pitch ball grid arrays (FBGAs), microBGAs, column-grid arrays (CGAs), chip-scale packages (CSPs) and flip chips. This option is ideal for determining z-position solder voids, inspecting wetting quality, detecting cracks in bond wires, inspecting BGA device joint stacks and ball bond quality and measurement of via plating in both IC and printed circuit board (PCB) production.

The intensifier in the system is a digital detector technology and video system that delivers distinct images in pseudo real-time of poor absorbing materials with enhanced contrast.

Additional features include the automated inspection of BGA and quad flat pack (QFP) solder joints by an algorithm for the automated pad wetting analysis, software for the automated backend, software for the automated die-attach voiding calculation following user-defined standards and an ergonomic design for comfortable operation.

www.phoenix-xray.com