No matter where in the world you are, chances are you spent some time watching the Olympic games that began in Beijing on Aug. 8, 2008. The culmination of the 8’s (eight is a lucky number for the Chinese) for many in the U.S. was the eighth gold medal won by Michael Phelps, breaking the previous record of seven. Record after record was smashed as athletes swam, rowed and ran faster than ever before. To ensure success these athletes did not rely on luck. They all trained to win.
As a designer or engineer, business owner, supplier or OEM, every day should be like a bit of Olympic training. To win the gold – no matter your chosen field – mandates a focus on continuous improvement. It’s true: Some great athletes seem to be born to their sport, but even for them, the only way to continue to break world records (even the ones they themselves have set) is to strive to do more.
In preparation, swimmers like Phelps undergo rigorous training designed to improve strength, speed and stamina. To succeed, tools are is refined, approaches tweaked, weaknesses coached, all to help the athletes gain a legitimate edge over the competition. What are you doing to improve your edge?
Training is a key component to continuous improvement. In a few weeks, PCB West will debut in its new fall rotation in Santa Clara, CA. At this writing, conference registration looks to break last year’s mark. It looks like a fair number of designers know where they can train to gain a competitive advantage.
There are new topics and speakers featured. Here are a few of my favorites.
Tuesday, Sept. 16, is the PCB Design, Fab and Assembly Roundtable. The topic of discussion is “Understanding the Dynamics of the Cost/Technology Equation Across the Supply Chain.” This is a unique opportunity to hear some leading PCB fabricators and ODM/EMS companies talk about what drives costs in the manufacturing equation.
Moderator Terry Heilman, president and CEO of Sunstone Circuits, will lead an easily recognizable group of PCB fabrication and assembly notables including, Peter Bigelow, IMI Inc.; Nilesh Naik, One Source; Nolan Johnson, Sunstone Circuits; George Dudnikov, Sanmina-SCI; and Andy Cameron, TTM Technologies. These speakers will provide insight into their company’s technology roadmap including design guidelines, cost of advancing technology and examples of cost/technology tradeoffs such as adding HDI microvia layers versus increasing overall layer count, or reducing lines and spaces to accommodate routing higher I/O devices.
This session, the first of a series of related supply chain topics, is organized to join designers, fabricators and assemblers in a forum that will help each to better understand the others’ constraints and business models. Like a gold medal-winning relay team, we need to be able to work together to achieve greatness. The better we understand the strengths (and weaknesses) of the other members of our supply team, the more likely we are to bring home the gold.
That afternoon on the exhibit hall floor, we will host Designer Decision 2008. It’s your opportunity to vote for the topics you think Printed Circuit Design and Fab needs to cover in the coming year. As your partner for information and educational materials, we want to know what topics you need to read and hear more about. And our 2009 editorial calendar will reflect the outcome of this unique event.
Come to “Meet the Authors,” where attendees can meet Charles Pfeil, author of BGA Breakouts and Routing, and Lee Ritchey, author of Right the First Time, A Practical Handbooks on High-Speed PCB and System Design, volumes 1 and 2. Pfeil and Ritchey will also teach classes during the week.
On Sept. 17, there will be a special session on “IC-Package-PCB Co-Design Strategies” with Lawrence Romine, Altium; How-Siang Yap, Agilent Technologies; Dr. Mike Heimlich, AWR Corp.; Egino Santo, Magma Design Automation and Hemant Shah of Cadence. This session will focus on system design that can help engineers and designers to bring a successful project to completion.
That’s just a fraction of the event-filled education and networking opportunities available at PCB West. Don’t miss out on the chance to improve your “game” for the upcoming year through one of the PCB West professional development building exercises. Brushing up on what’s new in technology is a surefire way to go for gold. For more information go to www.pcbwest.com.
