Editorial

Citation

Goosey, M. (2010), "Editorial", Circuit World, Vol. 36 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/cw.2010.21736baa.001

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: Circuit World, Volume 36, Issue 2

Despite the continuing broader economic issues impacting much of the world, the longer term prospects for the global electronics industry are still positive and the once humble printed circuit board (PCB) will continue to play a vital role as the key interconnection component in the majority of electronic devices and equipment. In fact, it has been predicted that the value of global PCB production will have exceeded $75 billion by 2012. Much of this will be represented by boards for high-performance and high-value products. In order to meet these demands, electronics manufacturers and PCB fabricators are increasingly having to offer enhanced performance characteristics from their products. This is especially true for PCBs, where both materials and manufacturing processes are continually evolving to meet the demands for smaller products with greater functionality, enhanced performance and reduced costs. Advanced PCBs are required to operate at increasingly high frequencies, while also offering interconnection features that are now often in the region of a few tens of microns. They are also required to be compatible with the demands of lead-free assembly, while providing long-term reliability using materials and processes that are more sustainable and environmentally friendly. There is also a growing use of components integrated within circuit boards and, for the future, there is likely to be an increasing need to integrate and combine optical and electrical functionality. These demands are forcing fabricators and their suppliers to develop novel processes and materials and to put them together in new ways to satisfy the performance demands of the industry. The five papers in this issue of Circuit World have a focus on some of the new approaches that may well be required to address the increasing performance and application demands mentioned above.

The first paper reports research work carried out in a large, multi-partner IeMRC-funded flagship project on the integration of optical and electronic interconnects within the PCB manufacturing process. This project was successful in demonstrating the preparation of optical waveguides using a range of manufacturing methods, some of which were largely untried before, and it also enabled the incorporation and demonstration of an optical and electrical interconnect PCB backplane into an industrial demonstrator system. This demonstrator was able to handle high-aggregate data rates between daughter cards on a PCB backplane without the performance limitations that would typically be encountered using conventional copper track-based interconnects.

The second paper comes from one of the PCB industry’s leading suppliers of process chemistry, Atotech, and it covers a new and less-hazardous approach to electroless copper deposition. Formaldehyde has long been the standard reducing agent for electroless copper processes used in the metallization of plated through-holes but, because of its environmental and potential health impacts, there is a growing desire to find a more acceptable replacement. Many alternatives have been evaluated in recent years, but some of them pose a greater health and safety threat than formaldehyde itself does, while other alternatives are not economically viable or are lacking in the performance they can offer. In the work reported in this paper, the more environmentally friendly, but relatively more expensive, glyoxylic acid, has been evaluated as an autocatalytic reducing agent. Details are given of how its concentration can be reduced, in order to reduce costs, without affecting the quality of the copper deposits.

The third paper is from Endicott Interconnect Technologies and covers the laser processing of materials as part of a new strategy toward materials design and fabrication for electronic packaging. The paper has a focus on the use of laser machining as a technique for fabricating device structures. It can be used to prepare capacitors of various thicknesses and is also capable of making vertical 3D multilayer-embedded capacitors from a single capacitance layer. Vertical multilayer capacitors are particularly beneficial for thicker capacitor layers, as they could be used in high-speed applications, where the thickness of the dielectric material in which they are embedded is greater.

The next paper reports work carried out to date on a UK Technology Strategy Board supported multi-partner project aimed at the development of a new lifecycle monitoring system for electronic manufacturing using embedded wireless components. This is another example of where a new opportunity has been opened up by the ability to incorporate devices within what, in all other respects, is essentially a conventional multilayer PCB. The paper reports early work carried out on the project to build a prototype of the embedded RFIX using bespoke or low-volume methodologies. This has enabled initial basic functionality and capability testing to be carried out. It will be interesting to see how this project progresses, as the incorporation of embedded wireless components within a PCB can provide valuable information throughout a product’s whole lifecycle, from manufacturing, through the use phase and on to end of life and recycling.

The final paper in this issue comes from Terepac and covers the subject of printing technology for ubiquitous electronics. The authors describe technology for printing relatively small circuits such as are used in RFID tags, smart cards and wirelessly connected sensors and they analyze it with respect to cost and suitability for such devices. A transfer printing technique is also described, which is able to place virtually any electronic component of a form suitable for conventional surface mount processes, but which works also for those which are very small and thin. The process detailed uses a photosensitive polymer to achieve complete selective adhesion at high speed with solid-state control over positioning. The authors are now looking to gain commercial experience in order to ascertain whether this process can deliver the ultimate productivity needed for RFID tags, wireless sensors, and hopefully the much broader and ubiquitous/miniaturized electronics industry.

The papers in this issue highlight some of the new developments that are taking place in the often converging worlds of interconnection and packaging and it is the development of such novel technologies that will enable the electronics industry to continue to offer the advanced performance required by end-users of its future products.

The preparation of this issue of Circuit World has coincided with the retirement of one of the key figures in the electronics industry and it would be remiss of me not to mention the outstanding contribution made to the world of interconnection and packaging by my former colleague, Dr David Pedder. David worked in the electronics industry for almost 40 years, having joined the Plessey Company at its Allen Clark Research Centre, Caswell in 1971. After working with Plessey, GEC and Intarsia, David has recently retired from TWI after a highly successful career. It has been a personal pleasure for me to have known and worked with David over many years and I want to take this opportunity to wish him a very happy retirement.

Finally, as always, I welcome your comments and feedback about the journal and its content. I would be pleased to hear from you and I can be contacted at: m.goosey@lboro.ac.uk

Martin Goosey