Circuits Assembly Online Magazine - News

News

BALVE, GERMANY – Solder material suppliers Balver Zinn and Cobar Group have signed an agreement to merge, a deal that would result in annual company sales of over $50 million. The deal is expected to close during the second quarter. No financial terms were disclosed.

ATLANTA – UP Media Group Inc. has extended the Call for Abstracts deadline for PCB Design Conference East 2007 to April 17. The annual conference and exhibition will be held on October 21-26, 2007, just outside Research Triangle Park, NC.

PCB East is the premier, annual East Coast conference and exhibition for emerging technologies used in the design and manufacture of PCBs, PLDs, MCMs, HDI, flexible circuits and related technologies. This event is sponsored by Printed Circuit Design & Manufacture and Circuits Assembly.

The five-day conference focuses on printed circuit board design, engineering and manufacturing. It is comprised of a three-day Technical Conference and a Professional Development Certificate program of one-day and two-day courses.

PCB East 2007 also includes a two-day exhibition (Oct. 23-24) of top industry vendors of products and services for electronic design automation (EDA), engineering/design services, prototyping, fabrication, assembly, etc.

Papers and presentations of the following durations are sought for the Technical Conference: 30-minute paper sessions, one-hour lectures or panel sessions, two-hour workshops, and half-day (3.5 hour) seminars. Papers and presentations also are sought for a Professional Development Certificate program of in-depth, one-day and two-day technical tutorials.

For consideration, e-mail your course title(s), suggested course length(s), 100- to 300-word course abstract(s), "who should attend" recommendation(s), and speaker bio(s) to Conference Co-Chair Kathy Nargi-Toth (knargitoth at upmediagroup.com) and Show Manager Alyson Skarbek (askarbek at upmediagroup.com) by April 17.

Papers and presentations must be noncommercial in nature and should focus on technology, techniques or methodology rather than on a company’s specific products.

Suggested paper and presentation topics include (but are not limited to):

- High speed, high frequency and signal integrity

- Component placement

- EMI/EMC analysis

- Thermal analysis

- Lead-free processes (especially how they affect design and fabrication)

- RF and microwave design

- Packaging design

- Mixed-signal design

- Area arrays

- FPGA design and implementation

- Embedded passives and active devices

- Flexible circuitry

- HDI design and technologies

- PCB design/layout basics

- Component library creation and management

- Design for manufacture, test and assembly

- Design (including analog, digital and power supplies)

- PCB fabrication

- Soldering

- Surface finishes

- Industry forecasts

- Business and design/supply chain issues

Selected papers and presentations will be due in August for inclusion in the proceedings. All Technical Conference papers and presentations are published in the conference proceedings and distributed to conference attendees, exhibitors and speakers. (Submissions selected for the Professional Development Certificate program are not included in the proceedings.)

Each speaker/presenter will receive a copy of the technical conference proceedings CD-ROM, a complimentary pass for the three-day technical conference, and complimentary admission to the two-day exhibition, and other special events.

For more information visit www.pcbeast.com.

TORONTO – Electronics manufacturing services provider SMTC Corp. announced fourth quarter earnings rose 49% to $2.1 million on a 31% spike in revenue to $76.1 million.

For the quarter ended Dec. 31, gross profit was $7.7 million, or 10.1% of revenue, up from $4.9 million (8.4% of revenue).

Full-year revenue rose 15% to $262.8 million, while the company set a net income record of $10.5 million, including one-time items of $5 million, compared with a loss of $100,000 for 2005.

“For the first time since 2000, the company grew year-over-year revenue, reflecting a combination of growth from long-standing customers and the effect of new customer additions in 2005 and 2006,” said John Caldwell, president and chief executive. "As important, SMTC produced seven consecutive quarters of profitability culminating in record net income for 2006."

The full year net income included an income tax refund, gain on a sale of surplus real estate, final proceeds from operations discontinued in 2002 and a net adjustment to restructuring accruals.

SAN JOSE – North American-based manufacturers of semiconductor equipment posted $1.65 billion in orders in February, the trade group SEMI said. The three-month average orders fell 1% from January, but were up 28% year-over-year.

The February book-to-bill ratio was 1.05, meaning that $105 worth of orders were received for every $100 of product billed for the month. It was the fifth straight month the ratio rose.

ESPOO, FINLAND – PCB maker Aspocomp Group will buy the minority stake in its ACP Electronics Ltd. joint venture from Taiwanese partner Chin-Poon Holdings, the company said today.

Aspocomp will spend 37.8 million euros to purchase the 49% minority interest in the Suzhou, China-based company. The deal is expected to be finalized in March.

Aspocomp Group Oyj owns 51% of ACP Electronics, and the JV’s net sales and results have been consolidated into Aspocomp's figures since 2001.

Aspocomp expects the acquisition will be accretive to the company’s result. Last year, Aspocomp reported net sales of 149 million euros. It was the 57th largest PCB fabricator in 2005, according to Dr. Hayao Nakahara of NT Information.

IRVING, TX – Top tier EMS firm Elcoteq has won a multi-year contract to build base stations and other products for Redline Communications. Other terms were not disclosed.

Under the deal, Elcoteq will be the primary EMS provider of manufacturing and NPI services for Redline’s RedMAX family of base stations and devices and its RedCONNEX backhaul products.

Elcoteq will provide low- to medium-volume production, full system integration, warranty repair and order fulfillment. NPI and manufacturing services will be handled through Elcoteq’s facilities in Dallas and Juárez, Mexico.

FRANKLIN, MA – On Apr. 19, Speedline will offer a Webcast on practical applications of design of experiments (DoE) and SPC. The Webinar will discuss factorial design and provide simple techniques with examples engineers and technicians can adapt to their production processes. The one-hour presentation begins at 11:00 a.m. EDT. For more information and to register, visit www.speedlinetech.com/seminars.

GLENVIEW, IL – Illinois Tool Works today reported operating revenue rose 15% for the three months ended Feb. 28. The conglomerate saw 2% growth from existing divisions and 11% from acquisitions.

Among ITW's major electronics assembly company holdings are Kester Solder, Speedline Technologies and ITW Chemtronics.

HANNOVER, Germany – Support for AMD’s new standard for small form factor PCs is growing, the chipmaker said today.

DTX open standard specification helps OEMs and suppliers to develop energy-efficient small form factor products that are smaller, quieter, and desktop-friendly. Akasa, Albatron, ASUS, Asetek, Compucase, ECS, Founder, FSP, Gigabyte, Hedy, NVIDIA, Shuttle, SilverStone Technology, Thermaltake and Tongfang have expressed support for DTX, AMD said.

SAN FRANCISCO -- The CFO and and executive vice president of Juniper Networks have resigned, the company said last night.

Juniper chief executive Scott Kriens said resignations were "not at all related to the financial model or the financial performance of the company." Juniper filed required financial statements for fiscal 2006 last Friday, following delays due to an internal probe into the network gear OEM's employee stock options disbursements.

MANKATO, MN -- EMS provider Winland Electronics reported fourth quarter revenues rose 5% to $9.2 million year-over-year, led by new customer wins and expanding sales to current customers base. The company recorded a record $37.9 million in sales for the year.

For the period ended Dec. 31, net income fell 92.4% to $51,036, compared to last year.

AMSTERDAM – Royal Philips Electronics has taken its first steps toward divesting its stake in Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), selling about 887 million shares to financial investors in Taiwan for about 1.3 billion euros in cash.

The move was expected: Philips on March 9 announced a multi-phased plan to divest itself from TSMC.

The sale generated proceeds of approximately 1.3 billion euros, and will result in a non-taxable gain of approximately 725 million euros for Philips’ first quarter 2007.

Philips now holds approximately 3,301 million shares in TSMC, lowering its holding in TSMC from 16.2% to 12.8%.