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WASHINGTON, DC – The latest update to AeA’s Competitiveness Series emphasizes the need to pass the pending free trade agreements with Colombia, Panama, and Peru. In the report, AeA says Central and South America are leading destinations for U.S. high-tech goods.

Rob Mulligan, AeA’s senior vice president international, states, “In terms of high-tech goods, the United States held a $14 billion trade surplus with the region in 2006, nearly 25% larger than it was in 2000.”

Last year, the U.S. exported $17.1 billion of high-tech products to Central and South America; combined, this makes the region the fourth largest destination for U.S. tech exports, ahead of the individual countries of China and Japan. Between 2005 and 2006, U.S. high-tech exports to Central and South America rose by 20%, says AeA.

High-tech imports from Central and South America declined by $200 million between 2005 and 2006, from $3.3 billion to $3.1 billion, says the report.

SINGAPORE – Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing is ramping production of Tezzaron Semiconductor’s ultra high-speed memory chips.

In addition, the two companies are working on the manufacture of Tezzaron’s 3-D devices, and hope to see them become the first 3-D ICs to be manufactured in volume.

With Tezzaron’s FaStack technology, device circuitry is divided into sections built onto separate wafers using standard processing. Chartered enables 3-D stacking of these wafers by building hundreds of thousands of Tezzaron’s embedded thru-silicon interconnections, called Super-Contacts, into the circuitry on each wafer. The wafers are then aligned with a precision of 0.5µm, bonded, thinned, and diced into individual devices. A FaStack chip functions as a single device.

Chartered and Tezzaron will enhance the 3-D IC designs and build them into wafers produced by Chartered. Tezzaron plans to offer many types of 3-D IC memories in two, three and five layers using NanoTSV technology.

Chartered is also manufacturing Tezzaron’s 3T-iRAM family of 2-D 72Mb memory devices.

SAN JOSE – The SIA today lowered its 2007 forecast for global microchip sales growth from 10% to 1.8%, citing drops in average selling prices. The new forecast projects total sales of $252 billion, rising to $306 billion in 2010, a 5.4% CAGR for year-end 2006 through 2010, said the trade group's president, George Scalise.

VANCOUVER -- PTL Electronics Ltd. has invested $1.1 million in new equipment and will open a manufacturing facility in August to meet customer demand. The EMS firm's new facility will double the existing manufacturing space, while and the new equipment is expected to increase capacity by 150%. It will bring the number of Siemens high-speed SMT lines to four, including a single line dedicated to prototypes.

The new facility will be situated close to the current location, and will open in August. It will include a dedicated area for full box-build assembly. PTL will operate in both locations simultaneously for two months to ease potential disruptions.

PTL, which is owned by Moventis Capital, grew 76% last year to $15.7 million and will have $5 million in backlogs for the quarter ending June 30.

NEENAH, WI -- Plexus Corp. executive Paul Ehlers, 51, died June 10 from cancer. Ehlers, who had been on medical leave since January 2007, was executive vice president and chief operating officer.

In a statement, chief executive Dean Foate said, "Paul was a tremendous leader and a trusted friend. His passion for life, his competitive nature and his eternal optimism resonated in everything he did. The overwhelming expressions of support over the past few months from customers, suppliers and fellow Plexus associates around the world is a testament to the positive impact that Paul had on the people and businesses that he touched. He will be deeply missed."