ATLANTA – PCB Design Conference West returns to the Santa Clara (CA) Convention Center this March. The annual PCB West conference and exhibition is geared toward PCB engineering, design and manufacture professionals. Highlights of the March 25-30 conference include a two-day exhibition; 14 free technical sessions; free exhibitor presentations; a professional development certificate program of eight full-day tutorials and two design excellence curriculum two-day courses; a three-day technical conference of 26 short courses; and several free networking events. Mentor Graphics vice president and general manager Henry Potts will keynote the conference, talking on the intersection of PCB design, ICs and hardware.
 
The conference brochure is available for download at www.pcbwest.com. Registration is currently open.

PALO ALTO -- Hewlett-Packard scientists this month disclosed a new way to make nanoscale computer chips that reportedly increases by eightfold the number of transistors on a chip, without making the transistors smaller.

The HP team's concept involves layering a structure called a nanowire on top of a conventional silicon chip, to increase the number of interconnects. Also, most of the wiring from the silicon is removed, allowing the more transistors to be crammed on the chip.

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TAIPEI -- Is ODM Asustek Computer going to follow the path blazed by Acer, BenQ Mobile and others and go head-to-head with its customers?

That's the talk -- and it's coming from the company itself.

Company spokesman Jonathan Tsang told DigiTimes the company plans to split its ODM and OEM production  within three years.

Asustek builds and markets motherboards, notebook PCs, servers, handsets and LCD TVs under the Asus brand. Sales from Asus notebooks are nearing those of contract revenues, Tsang said.

No decision has been made but the company plans to make a separation in three years, DigiTimes reported Tsang as saying.

SAN CLEMENTE, CA – Inspection equipment OEM YESTech has sold its 500th AOI system, the company announced today. Panasonic purchased the system for its Reynosa, Mexico, plant. Panasonic first purchased YESTech’s AOI in 2005.