Printed Circuit Design & Manufacture articles from July 2003

Printed Circuit Design & Manufacture archives from July 2003

Heat effects of vias in pads. (Letters).(Letter to the Editor)
July 1, 2003... I READ THE article by Michael Jouppi (Current and Conductors, May 2003) and was left with one question. There is no mention of putting vias in pads to manage current and heat. What is the overall consensus of this practice? Al Zollo ...

The common denominator.(Letter to the Editor)
July 1, 2003... CONGRATULATIONS ON THE transition to PCD&M. I am sure that you will capture a larger audience for many reasons, some of which you stated in your editorial (Ourline, April 2003). There are additional reasons why I foresee this to be a growth...

The CE gospel. (Letters).(Letter to the Editor)
July 1, 2003... JUST RECEIVED THE inaugural [issue] and wish you success. I like your emphasis on bringing together the disciplines of design and fab. Too often have I seen catastrophic boo-boos made by designers who didn't have a clue as to how...

Our apologies to the bag ladies. (Letters).(Letter to the Editor)
July 1, 2003... I ABOUT SPLIT a gut reading the "The Psychology of Trade Shows" (Ourline, May 2003). I agree with your Official Guide to Trade Show Attendees, except for the Headus propellerus genus. As a frequent trade show participant (on both sides of the...

Electronics hold their own. (Market Watch).
July 1, 2003... ELECTRONICS HOLD THEIR OWN Trends in the U.S. electronics equipment market (shipments only). % CHANGE FEB MARCH APRIL YTD Computers and ...

Biometrics spies big market. (Market Watch).
July 1, 2003... NORWALK, CT -- Interest in quick and automatic identification of people is fueling an annual growth rate of 30% growth in biometrics, according to a soon-to-be-released report from Business Communications Co. (bccresearch.com). The global...

Handset sales retain 'form'. (Market Watch).
July 1, 2003... FRAMINGHAM, MA -- Demand for handsets grew last quarter, reflecting broad consumer interest in voice-enabled mobile devices, a market research group has found. "The evolution of color displays, digital imaging and converged handheld...

U.S. manufacturing down in May. (Market Watch).
July 1, 2003... TEMPE, AZ -- Economic activity in the manufacturing sector failed to grow in May, while the overall economy grew for the 19th consecutive month, according to a survey of U.S. purchasing executives. The May PMI, a measure of growth, was 49.4%,...

Industry market snapshot. (Market Watch).
July 1, 2003... INDUSTRY MARKET SNAPSHOT Book-to-bills of various components. JAN. FEB. MARCH APRIL Semiconductor equipment (1) 0.94 0.98 0.91 0.86 Semiconductors (2) 2.4% -3.3% 2.7% ...

Free CD on flex design.
July 1, 2003... A UK PCB maker has released an updated guide to flex circuit design. The guide is available free of charge on CD-ROM by request from Teknoflex (teknoflex.com) and will soon be available online.

CAD collaboration.
July 1, 2003... Cimmetry Systems (cimmetry.com) in May said its viewer and markup tool, AutoVue, integrates seamlessly with Open Text's Livelink CADManager, providing collaboration and data management to CAD applications. AutoCAD users can save documents to...

Eltek cuts staff.
July 1, 2003... Eltek Ltd. (eltek.co.il) will reduce staffing and wages among other cost-saving initiatives to improve the PCB maker's balance sheet. The company didn't specify how many employees would be affected, nor did it indicate how much savings would be...

Unicap in default.
July 1, 2003... Unicap Electronics (unicap.com.tw) has submitted a reorganization plan to the Shihlin District Court in Taipei, according to published reports. The PCB maker is undergoing financial problems at its factory in Taiwan and reportedly has had three...

Compeq bags ICs for flip chips.
July 1, 2003... Citing less competition, Compeq Manufacturing (compeq.com) will cut production of substrates for flip chips in favor of making HDI PCBs as well as IC substrates. Production of flip-chip IC substrates won't be cut, the company said.

Mania offloads Option.
July 1, 2003... Option Technologies Europe Ltd., a supplier of masslam, has split in a management buyout from ManiaTechnologie UK.

PDI shuts down.
July 1, 2003... Precision Diversified Industries (Plymouth, MN) closed its facility due to reduced demand for circuit boards and permanently laid off 79 workers. The company, which specialized in quickturn prototype boards and design services, was founded in...

Altium reveals 'board-on-chip' technology. (Embeds IC cores, software on FPGAs).
July 1, 2003... SYDNEY -- Altium Ltd. (altium.com) in May previewed a technology that combines software and hardware design in an integrated design environment. The company believes the technology will enable engineers to use board-level design methodologies...

Bad water.
July 1, 2003... A former wastewater supervisor at Tyco's PCB plant in Manchester, CT, faces up to three years in prison and $250,000 in fines after pleading guilty to violating U.S. pollution laws. Robert Smith reportedly helped falsify reports that "failed to...

Court upholds $32m Nelco verdict.
July 1, 2003... A U.S. appeals court in May upheld a $32.3 million breach-of-contract judgment in favor of Nelco Technology Inc. (park nelco.com). Nelco claimed that Delco Electronics Corp. (delco.com) failed to follow through on orders for masslam circuit...

Golden guy.
July 1, 2003... Parelec Inc. (parelec.com) president Steve Ludmerer has received the 2003 Golden C Award from the Commercial Development and Marketing Association in recognition of outstanding accomplishments toward the growth of the industry. Ludmerer was...

RSI has new UK, Ireland distributor.
July 1, 2003... Router Solutions Inc. (rsi-inc.com), a CAD interface software and services provider, has signed a partnership agreement with PCB CAM Solutions Ltd. (pcbcam.co.uk), a newly formed CAD and manufacturing solutions provider based in Wimborne,...

Clarification.
July 1, 2003... In the May issue, PCD&M said that Viasystems Canada has closed. In fact, Viasystems Canada closed its facility in Granby, Quebec. Viasystems Canada's plants in Pointe-Claire and Kirkland are active and remain a central part of Viasystems'...

Calculator measures trace temp change. (Current carrying capacity update).
July 1, 2003... CENTENNIAL, CO -- Mike Jouppi has spent years updating the PCB current carrying capacity charts. Now his company, Thermal Man (thermalman.com), is releasing a calculator that measures temperature change in traces of different sizes, in...

NECA crafts new path. (Manufacturing).
July 1, 2003... MANCHESTER, NH -- Regional circuit board organizations are trying to make a comeback and the North East Circuits Association (necaonline.org) is providing a template for how to do it. In a May 8 meeting, a leading fabricator offered several...

Events. (Happenings).
July 1, 2003... SEPTEMBER 8-11 Conference on the Commercialization of Micro and Nano Systems Amsterdam. Contact; University of Twente; C.j.m.eijkel@el.utwente.nl 10-12 Philtronics (Philippine International Electronics Mfg....

Shipley Co. (Faces).
July 1, 2003... Shipley Co. (shipley.com) promoted Bob Ferguson to PWB general manager, North America. He was PWB vice president sales and marketing, North America. Shipley also named Jean-Pierre Robic as PWB general manager, Europe. He is also vice president,...

Enthone Inc. (Faces).
July 1, 2003... Enthone Inc. (enthone.com) named John Yim vice president sales, Asia. Yim, who joined Cookson Electronics in 1990, has also worked as a sales manager for LeaRonal (shipley.com) and Elec and Eltek (eleceltek. com). He has a bachelor's in...

West Coast Enterprises. (Faces).
July 1, 2003... West Coast Enterprises (Ontario, CA) named Paul G. Brady general manager, responsible for new business development for copper-clad laminates and prepregs. Brady is a 30-year industry veteran who has held sales and marketing positions and run...

Winonics Inc. (Faces).
July 1, 2003... Winonics Inc. (winonics.com) named Steve Wall East Coast regional sales manager. He was regional sales manager at Toppan Electronics (toppanelectronics.com) and senior mechanical engineer at Siemens (siemens.com). Winonics also named Jon Bunce...

Visteon Corp. (visteon.com) has selected Ohio Design Automation's (ohio-da.com) InterComm ECAD visualization and collaboration software. (It's A Deal).
July 1, 2003... Visteon Corp. (visteon.com) has selected Ohio Design Automation's (ohio-da.com) InterComm ECAD visualization and collaboration software for Visteon's in-process PCB design review. EDS (eds.com) has integrated InterComm into its product...

Nan Ya Plastics' copper clad laminate division (nanyapcb.com) named West Coast Enterprises (Ontario, CA) as its distributor in the western U.S. WCE. (It's A Deal).
July 1, 2003... Nan Ya Plastics' copper clad laminate division (nanyapcb.com) named West Coast Enterprises (Ontario, CA) as its distributor in the western U.S. WCE will supply CAF-resistant, halogen-free and low Dk materials. WCE will also establish...

CAD Design Software (cad-design.com) named Unidost A.S. (unidost.com) its distributor in Austria, Switzerland, central and eastern Europe, and parts of Israel and Germany. (It's A Deal).
July 1, 2003... CAD Design Software (cad-design.com) named Unidost A.S. (unidost.com) its distributor in Austria, Switzerland, central and eastern Europe, and parts of Israel and Germany. Unidost will support the RF/microwave, hybrid/MCM, IC packaging, IC...

Finding a great global partner: customers value their domestic relationships: use that to your advantage. (Power Selling).
July 1, 2003... SO YOU'RE READY to admit that the world has gone global. You have been told by a number of customers that they want you to handle their offshore volume requirements. This is happening more and more, as customers realize that they do in fact...

Globalization? I thought it takes a village! The expectations, needs or desires of customers haven't changed, just the number of options for satisfying them. (ROI).
July 1, 2003... EVERY ONCE IN a while--and more often recently--I get into one of those thorny conversations. It always starts the same way--we are talking about our companies, comparing notes on business, technological issues, the "problem(s) of the day,"...

Golden circuits: getting the most from good designs: time is money, and reusing known good sectors of PCBs can save you both. It's time to get physical, as well as logical. (Reuse).
July 1, 2003... PCB designers are constantly on the lookout for tools and processes that help save time and deliver a quality end-product. The ability to implement design reuse helps meet both goals. Design reuse is common in many industries. A trip to the...

Adjacent layer signal routing: avoiding crosstalk and signal reflections takes more than putting adjacent layer conductors at right angles. (Interconnect Strategies).
July 1, 2003... ROUTING STRATEGIES THAT successfully minimize the cost of board fabrication while maintaining high routing density are as popular as ever. Since the advent of multilayer PCBs, adjacent signal routing layers have been used in PCB construction to...

The inductance of a transmission line: understanding the relationship between total loop inductance of a line, time delay and its characteristic impedance. (No Myths Allowed).
July 1, 2003... IN EVERY UNIFORM transmission line there is a simple relationship between its characteristic impedance, its time delay and its loop inductance. This applies to every line, whether a microstrip, stripline, coplanar or even twisted-pair. The only...

Sleight of hand: a hand-screened soldermask test unmasked an effective tool for process improvement. (Factory Floor).
July 1, 2003... IT WAS THE typical Friday afternoon call, and all too common in technical service: "What are you doing Monday? Have time for a soldermask trial?" Not to mention, Monday is the short week of Thanksgiving, when two extremes always coexist:...

Designing for impedance testing: maintaining signal integrity on impedance-controlled PCBs is easier when the design accounts for the test method. (Cover Story).
July 1, 2003... TDR impedance testing of high-speed boards is routine and reliable. For tighter specifications and high-speed performance on standard low-cost base materials, however, automated TDR impedance testing has its advantages. The economics apply...

PCB prototyping system. (Off the shelf: machines materials tools systems software).
July 1, 2003... The QC9000 is designed for applications that require a large work area and is said to be especially suited for prototyping larger RF antenna and backplane PCB designs. New features include a work area of 19" x 19" (480 mm x 480 mm); a...

EDA-neutral design browser. (Off the shelf: machines materials tools systems software).
July 1, 2003... Intercomm 5.0 features an EDA-neutral file format for all schematic and layout data, reportedly reducing file size 50 to 80%. A novel translator displays markups in Japanese, Chinese and English at a single touch. Is viewable across design,...

Schematic capture, sim tools. (Off the shelf: machines materials tools systems software).
July 1, 2003... Multicap 7 schematic capture tool is for pure schematic entry, driving simulation or feeding PCB layout. Features modeless operation, autowiring, part placement from desktop parts bins, "rubberbanding" of part moves, single-step wiring of buses...

Low-loss laminate. (Others Of Note).
July 1, 2003... IS 640 low Dk, low-loss material is for high-speed digital and RF applications. Comes in standard E-glass and thickness configurations and can be used in pure package or hybrid constructions. Is said to have a DK of 3.2-3.4 and a dissipation...

OEM product roadmap. (Others Of Note).
July 1, 2003... Written by product managers at major North American OEMs, this latest version of the roadmap forecasts and analyzes the business, regulatory, market and technology scene over the next several years, and lists the types of PCBs, software,...

Design content extraction. (Others Of Note).
July 1, 2003... The IC2 suite changes document-based datasheets into EDA system design-ready symbols and package geometries. SymXpert extracts pin information from component datesheets, applies user-defined rules to customize symbol graphics and generates...

Footprint symbol locator. (Others Of note).
July 1, 2003... Quicklib 1.0 search-and-browse tool is for locating and previewing symbols from footprint libraries. Permits parameters querying and instant viewing, including graphic representation. WHO: Sedona Research Corp. WEB: sedonaresearch.com

Board impedance predictor. (Others Of Note).
July 1, 2003... The Si8000m controlled-impedance design system predicts finished board impedance controlled yield based on the tolerance data of raw material. Incorporates a field-solver based on the boundary element method, and is capable of modeling multiple...

PCB film packaging. (Others Of Note).
July 1, 2003... Accumax and other PCBs films are now packaged in improved vacuum-sealed foil bags and plastic sleeves, and have a plastic stiffener board to help eliminate fibers within the film bag. Helps reduce artifacts, permitting ultra-clean phototools....

Labor of love. (Our Line).
July 1, 2003... ON May 26 my son was born, which means that for my family labor day came on Memorial Day. I was awoken at 4 that morning by the sound of my wife's voice (expletive deleted) coming from the bathroom, where her water had just broken. A...