In this week's PCB Asia Week, the PCB industry looks very active, with companies such as TECHWISE Circuits increasing their technical know-how, while others, including TUC, ramp up their exports. Chunghong, on the other hand, is raising capital through a listing on the TSE.

Enthone Inc., a business of Cookson Electronics, has introduced ENTEK OM. The patented Organic Metal process delivers a visible, highly conductive PWB final finish that offers both ease of inspection and in-circuit testing (ICT).

Today's video equpment operates at gigabit rates, necessitating the use of large coaxial BNC connectors. Non-optimized BNC footrpints can cause impedance mismatches, reflections and signal loss. In this paper, Tsun-kit Chin of National Semiconductor discusses some common issues with BNC footprints, such as problems with the connector-to-board transition, and offers techniques for transparent footprint designs.

We live in a service-driven society. It's a big market out there, and we can accept or reject products or services as we see fit. So, it's really darn important for a company selling a product or service to provide customer service at a standard that meets (or exceeds) the consumer's expectations.

Enthone's research has focused on providing a solderable surface finish for PCBs containing organic nanometal. The first universal nanofinish was proposed four years ago. Now, the new-generation nanofinish with organic metal-Ag complex performs as well as any other surface finish with regard to aging resistance, discoloration and solderability.

Global sales of semiconductors grew to $25.2 billion in July, an increase of 1.2% from June when sales were $24.9 billion and an increase of 37% from July 2009 when sales were $18.4 billion, the SIA reported. Year-to-date sales total $169.2 billion, an increase of 46.7% from the $115.3 billion reported for the first seven months of 2009.

Compared to the previous year, the PCB Division increased its net proceeds during the period by 27.3% to CHF 17.8 million (first half of 2009: CHF 14.0 million); During the period, the ES Division achieved net proceeds of CHF 44.8 million (first half of 2009: CHF 41.5 million).

Is North America falling behind the rest of the world in HDI technology development? Not if Dan Smith can help it. "The New Mr. HDI" is putting together the first IPC HDI certification course and exam. We caught up with him and discussed the HDI course, what it takes to be an instructor and Happy Holden's 400-gig "data dump."

Authors from Sandia National Laboratories investigate the solderability of current immersion Ag technology after exposure to conditions that simulate long-term storage followed by bake out environments prior to actual reflow assembly.

Roy Porat, who has been with Camtek since 2001 serving in various positions in the United States and Asia, and for the past two years as General Manager of the company, is to succeed Rafi Amit as CEO. Amit will become Active Chairman of the Board of Directors.