News
AUSTIN, TX -- Low-cost assembly of RFID chips and antennas may be the most critical roadblock to reaching a five-cent RFID tag. With this in mind, TechSearch International has created a workshop to address assembly issues associated with RFID tag manufacturing.
Low-Cost RFID IC Packaging and Assembly: Roadblock on the Highway to a 5-cent RFID Tag, will be held March 29-30 in Austin, TX. The workshop will provide a forum for experts on all aspects of RFID IC packaging and assembly to present their work.
Rick Koskella, Sun Microsystem, will give the opening presentation -- RFID Scorecard: Accomplishments and Issues -- based on the experiences from Sun's RFID test center in Texas. Dr. Gitanjali Swamy will present a cost model for RFID. Presentations from semiconductor makers and inlay manufacturers include speakers from Philips, Texas Instruments, Celis Semiconductor, Alien Technology, Symbol Technologies and KSW Microtech.
Equipment makers, including Muhlbauer and Toray Engineering, will share their experiences in the RFID tag assembly area. A presentation on printed electronics will be given by Dr. Dan Gamota, Motorola. Presentations will also highlight RFID activities in Japan and China. Dr. Frank Bachner of TechSearch will moderate a panel discussing the key challenges to lowering RFID inlay and tag assembly cost.
HONG KONG -- Hong Kong-based Trans Global Logistics is advising air freight shippers to plan for an extra couple of days' transit time from Asia gateways beginning in mid-March. The reason? Air freight volumes - fueled by high-tech and electronics shipments - are aniticpated to surge as the "mini peak season" takes shape.
According to the company, recent canceled flights out of Hong Kong will add to a backlog of freight. And although air lift serving Shanghai has increased since last year, growing demand from shippers is creating a tight space situation. Carriers are expected to increase rates up to 25% this month.With business activity in India picking up, transit times are expected to be three to four days longer than last month. Carriers are generally only committing confirmed transit times for Express service.
Looking ahead, president Robert Mooney stated that another surge in the price fo crude oil may cause airlines to pass along these costs through higher fuel surchaces (FSC). Hong Kong carriers have already announced a return to $0.36/Kg FSC, effective March 22.
The company is now authorized to distribute all Foxconn brand products, including motherboards, chassis and coolers. The agreement covers all territories of ASBIS' current operation.
The partnership will promote the sales of Foxconn products throughout 26 countries with distribution centers located in Holland, the Czech Republic, United Arab Emirates and Finland. Foxconn will provide a three-year warranty for motherboards and two-year warranty for chassis, power supply, coolers and card readers.
Bumping helps in high-speed, high-power applications that need quick turn to validate design, and helps provide better test simulation prior to final design. When cycle time is important, cost is critical and resources are limited, bumping a few die at a time can be effective to evaluate a design.
The process is applicable to traditional or MEMS components, and bumps can be applied to a substrate or die. Bump-to-bump variability is reportedly reduced compared to other processes such as solder jetting, screen-printing or electroplating. The traditional prototype method of using gold studs followed by thermocompression or thermosonic bonding can be eliminated.
The company can also attach solder balls to bare Al bond pads. The same hardware can be used to bump a die with various alloys to evaluate lead-free solutions. Alternating pads on the die can be bumped with differing alloys or geometry, allowing electromigration studies within the same die or within one wafer. This also reduces lot-to-lot and wafer-to-wafer variation.
The process is said to eliminate variables such as paste viscosity, metal load changes, missing bumps, voiding, and changes in size and planarity.
CVI can accommodate individual die bumping, partial wafer bumping, or die repair with various alloy compositions. Contact Terence Collier for more information: tqcollier@covinc.com.
Action Circuits services large component distributors, key names in the automotive industry and is the only approved programming center for Quicklogic Corp., Xilinx Inc. and Altera Corp. in Europe. The Luton, England-based company expects to program over 12 million devices this year.
The company's High Performance Circuits facility was named a member of the EPA's National Environmental Performance Track program, joining more than 300 facilities nationwide in their commitment to consistently exceed environmental regulation requirements. Teradyne is among only six companies in New Hampshire to be selected, the company said.
The National Environmental Performance Track program is designed to recognize and encourage top environmental performers -- those that go beyond compliance with regulatory requirements to attain levels of environmental performance and management that benefit people, communities and the environment, the company said in a statement.
The Teradyne plant qualified for the program through its performance, continuous commitment to environmental compliance and implementation of a strong environmental management system.
"Performance Track facilities represent a new generation of environmental leaders who have the vision to embrace the strategies that will protect the environment for generations to come," said Dan Fiorino, director of EPA's Performance Incentives Division.
COLLEGE PARK, MD - DfR Solutions and Interface Sciences Corp. have begun a joint investigation into potential improvements in CAF resistance through the application of ISC's molecular assembly and deposition technologies.
DfR Solutions, which has extensive experience in CAF experimentation and failure analysis, has identified this technology as a critical link in ensuring CAF robustness in high-density printed boards subjected to Pb-free reflow. The ISC process increases the uniformity and surface density of silane coupling agents on glass reinforcement - up to four times denser - compared with current technology, the companies said in a joint statement. This is expected to improve the intrinsic resistance of the fiber/epoxy bond to hydrolysis and cracking (during drilling), decreasing the influence of manufacturing defects on CAF. In addition, the process enables the deposition of novel surface chemistries that are expected to suppress filament formation. Substantial increases in CAF resistance are expected from the combination of these effects.
DFR and
Interface are currently establishing supply chain development channels with
glass, laminate and PCB manufacturing companies.
Accutronix is a privately-held electronics manufacturer with 47 employees in Owingsville, KY.
Mark Fulks, senior vice president at Key, becomes general manager for the Kentucky operation.
Key employs about 100 workers at its New Albany factory, and is constructing a 104,000 sq. ft. office and manufacturing facility in Jeffersonville, IN. The new plant is scheduled to be opened this summer.
The fourth-quarter net loss narrowed but sales declined sharply. Revenue and earnings were hurt by an unanticipated volume decline from a major customer that operates in a cyclical sector, the company said.
For the year the company generated $5.1 million in cash from operations. down from $5.5 million for 2003.
In a press release, John Caldwell, president and chief executive, said, "We expect to produce sequential revenue growth by the second quarter of 2005 and continue with positive momentum through the back half of the year."
For the fourth quarter the company reported a net loss of
$2.5 million on sales of $48 million. SMTC took $700,000 in restructuring
and other one-time charges. SMTC lost $2.6 million on revenue of $76.9 million a year ago.
For the year, the EMS maker posted a net loss of $4.5 million on net sales of $475.4 million.
For the quarter net sales were up 47%
increase from last year on higher demand for semiconductor capital equipment, aerospace and
defense, industrial and medical gear. The net loss was $1.3 million, vs. a net loss of $6.1 million.
For the year, the net loss was $4.5 million, vs. a net loss of $34.3 million in 2003.
The operating loss improved to $400,000 from $5.5 million
a year ago. Sequentially, fourth-quarter net sales decreased 10%, due to lower
demand for semiconductor tools.
Chief information officers predict spending growth of 5.9% over the next 12 months, up from 5.4% reported during January, according the magazine's monthly poll.
Telecom equipment and infrastructure software had the largest number of CIOs who predict increases.
"The February results are somewhat reassuring" said Gary Beach, group publisher of CXO Media, the company that publishes CIO. "After three straight monthly declines, it is a good sign we are seeing some leveling off. CIOs are now facing
a more constrained environment and must make hard choices between infrastructure maintenance and system upgrades. I believe in the coming months we will see a slow but steady rate of growth. However, unless the CEO and CFO loosen the
purse strings, we will not see explosive growth."
"Although IT spending projections improved modestly from January levels, CIO spending expectations have declined noticeably from last fall," said Chris Whitmore, director IT hardware research for Deutsche Bank Securities. "The upswing
this month in the telecom and infrastructure software markets is one highlight in the data. However, it remains to be seen if this is the beginning of a trend."
AYLESBURY, ENGLAND -- EMS company TT Electronics has acquired the contract assembly arm of Dage Holdings Ltd. No financial details were made available.
Dage Electronics Integrated Systems has sites in
Suzhou, China, and the
U.K.
TT Electronics called the asset acquisition "complementary," saying
DEIS has strong backplane design and manufacturing capabilities.
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