The term/concept of synergy seems very apt when applied to the interaction of the Occam process solderless assembly concept in combination with a unique PCB interconnection technology called twisted wire interconnect or TWI.

The electronics industry’s mantra has for many years been "Smaller, Faster, Lighter, Better and Cheaper."

Part 2 of this retrospective, seen in last month’s issue of Global SMT and Packaging, took a bit of a detour from the topic to explore the reasoning and the impact of the ‘80% Rule.’

Part one left off noting that surface mount brought with it significant advantages to IC packaging but also that there was need to provide guidance for future development. The result of that effort is something that is now known as the ‘80% rule.’

Since the beginning, all IC packages have been designed to perform the basic tasks of interconnecting and protecting the semiconductor die and making it useful for interconnection at the next level.

All IC packaging technology structures since the invention of the integrated circuit itself have been tasked to perform, at a minimum, the simple and fundamental tasks of interconnecting and protecting the semiconductor die and making it useful for interconnection at the next level.

The 8th International workshop on microelectronics assembly and packaging technologies was held in late November of last year and continues to be one of the best–kept open secrets of the IC packaging industry.

In October of this year, I had the privilege to visit CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research.

Just–released high density interconnection ‘bible’ provides valuable advice and technical guidance for the future.

The electronics industry has, over the course of the last half century, transformed the world in a way that only science fiction writers could have imagined when the industry was still in its infancy.