One of the largest exhibitions for the printed circuit industry was held on June 6 through June 8 at Tokyo Big Sight in Japan.
The three-day show is held in Tokyo every June, and attracts a worldwide audience. This year, relating events at the show included JIEP 2018, Jisso Protec 2018, Total Organic Expo 2018, WIRE Japan Show 2018 and Smart Sensing 2018.
More than 500 companies and organizations reserved booths. This year’s event was about 10% larger than last year's, making it nearly impossible to visit and review the entire exhibition in three days. I decided to divide and conquer by focusing on flexible circuits and related technologies.
There were more flexible circuit manufacturers than rigid circuit board manufacturers; most were small to mid-sized companies. A few traveled from other countries, and introduced some unique technologies. Oki Electric Cable had a very interesting look to its display booth. It was like a department store for specialty flex circuits. It displayed stretchable (elastic) circuits, transparent circuits, extremely long circuits (up to 100 meters), high heat-resistant circuits and more. Yamashita Materials displayed many samples of low-loss flexible circuits for high frequency telecommunications with LCP (liquid crystal polymer) films. A representative from Yamashita complained that a material supply shortage is causing disruptions in production.
Material suppliers showcased many new products. DuPont-Toray introduced a polyimide-base etchable coverlay film. This new film will reduce costs by reducing the labor-consuming coverlay process employed now for flex circuit manufacturing. Nippon Polytech, a printing ink manufacturer, introduced a coverlay ink with high mechanical performances. Kaneka, another major polyimide film supplier, featured a new polyimide base bonding sheet to build up multilayer flex circuits.
JCU, a specialty chemical supplier featured a new chemical plating process to produce adhesiveless flexible laminates as an alternative process for sputtering. The basic idea was created more than 30 years ago, but the process did not have enough bond strength, and it was never commercialized. The new process that uses the special surface treatments has very reliable bond strength at a low cost. The process is available not only for polyimide films, but also the other plastic films such as COP, PEN and PEEK.
Several specialty chemical supplies introduced a new semi-additive process to generate ultrafine traces on flexible substrates. Okuno Chemical featured microscopic photos of one micron line/space traces. Competition to produce fine line circuits is heating up again, but it will take few more years for these technologies to be practical for flexible circuit manufacturers.
Yamaha Fine Tech displayed a new four contacts resistance tester for high-density flexible circuits with microvia holes. A sales representative from Yamaha told me some of its larger customers (Apple is one) requested that circuit manufacturers begin testing 100% for conductor resistance instead of open/short tests.
UME, the largest EMS manufacturer in Japan, is undergoing changes to its automobile business. Consumers looking to purchase new vehicles are focusing on higher reliability at lower prices.
I did not come across anything surprising during the exhibition; however, there were a lot of small technological advances for flexible circuits. Mostly, the new technologies were developed by Japanese companies, but these small advancements will not have any significant impact over the next couple of years.
Things are chugging along for flex circuit manufacturers, and I believe the small and mid-sized flex circuit manufactures will remain the technological leaders in the global market.
Dominique K. Numakura, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
DKN Research, www.dknresearch.com
DKN Research Newsletter #1814, June 10th, 2018 (English Edition)(Micro Electronics & Packaging)
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Headlines of the Week
1. Taiyo Yuden (major component supplier in Japan) commercialized the world's thinnest ceramic capacitor, PMK063LBJ104MN Series. Chip size: 0.6 x 0.3 x 0.09 mm
2. Alps (major module manufacturer in Japan) acquired Greina Technologies, in Salt Lake City to strengthen the technologies of sensor business.
3. Riken (major R&D organization in Japan) developed a new thin flexible photovoltaic cell based on transparent polyimide varnish supplied by Mitsui Chemical. It will be wearable.
4. Renesas (major semiconductor manufacturer in Japan) decided to close its manufacturing plant in Ube-shi, Yamaguchi prefecture. Its Kochi plant was closed in May 2018.
5. Nippon Kayaku (specialty chemical supplier in Japan) developed a new transparent liquid crystal display on shiny film substrate.
6. Panasonic (major electronics company in Japan) commercialized a new low-loss laminate series, R-5515, for radar circuit boards at 80GHz bands. The loss is 20% lower compared to PTFE substrates.
7. Obayashi Co. (major construction company in Japan) decided to build the second 50MW class biomass power generation plant in Ibaraki Prefecture. It consumes timber base fuels.
8. Flexceed (major tape circuit manufacturer in Japan) codeveloped with Taiyo Yuden a next-generation semiconductor package technology called POL (Power Overlay) for power devices.
9. Nippon Densan (major module manufacturer in Japan) developed a new quick-charging system for electric vehicles. It enables 500km driving on 15 min. charging.
10. Murata (major component supplier in Japan) will invest 29 billion yen to build a new manufacturing plant (floor size: 54,000 sq. meters) of MLCC to cover the growing demands.
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