MINNEAPOLIS, Dec. 8 -- Dr. Udo E. Frank took home the the Best Paper Award for the International Wafer-Level Packaging Congress held October in San Jose.

Frank, of FeinFocus GmbH, received the award for his paper "Detecting and Analyzing Wafer Bump Voids with X-ray Inspection," in which he disclosed an x-ray imaging technology said to detect and measure voids within solder bumps on chips. The paper also revealed software that determines component viability based on preset threshold values.

The event was sponsored by SMTA. Papers detailed leading-edge IC packaging and test technologies with special emphasis on 3D stacked packaging.

The x-ray inspection system detailed in Frank's paper converts 3D voids to measurable 2D images, enabling the system to calculate the ratio of the size of the void within a solder bump to the total mass of the ball. The system can also determine the largest linear distance between two points in the void and compare the result with the diameter of the ball.

The paper will soon be online in at smta.org.