BIOMEDevice 2015 was held at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center on May 6.
The event features top suppliers and new technologies from the medtech industry, and featured local industries from New Hampshire and Massachusetts as well as companies from California. Relating events at the show included Design & Manufacturing, Electronics New England, Plastec New England and Quality Expo Showcase. Although the event is regional, there were still more than 350 companies with exhibits, and many more visitors than I expected.
It was standing-room-only at the open seminars. I did not discover any new products or technologies that could be an earth-shattering event, but I did pick up a lot of useful information. The convention was not specifically targeting the medical industry; however, all the vendors and sales representatives focused their presentations on medical technologies and business. This shows how important and profitable the medical device business is for electronics companies in New England.
More than half of the exhibitors were headquartered in New England, and the remaining traveled from the midwest, West coast and Canada, and a few companies from Japan, Taiwan and Singapore sent sales reps to the event.
Almost all the exhibitors featured products and technologies related to the medical industry. Some of these featured materials included metal and plastic resins, plastic molding and tubing, chemical etching and forming, fine laser processing, electronic and mechanical components, assembling services, and PCBs (there were a handful of flex circuit manufacturers). The show was not limited to manufacturing firms. There were several companies affiliated with designs, simulations, evaluations, testing and analysis.
Most of these local manufacturers do not have volume production capabilities geared for worldwide expansion, but they do have cutting-edge technologies and can create manufacturing lines for new medical devices. Any business they attracted at this event will not require a huge investment, and is usually a win-win for the company and the prospective client.
I was hoping to gain some market information about new technology trends for medical devices, and how this can relate to the printed circuit board industry. Unfortunately, there was very little information about market trends. Several companies displayed actual medical devices that they produced for some of their clientele. These representatives could not explain the mechanisms or speak about any business trends from their fields, but they did provide professional advice related to many of these medical devices.
The exhibition was still a great networking opportunity. I found a few local manufacturers for elastic sheets to use for flexible substrates, printable light sources, functional membrane switches and more. This type of business is in my wheelhouse; my passion is designing new electronic devices. I try and use local businesses from New England for my manufacturing and collaborative business needs.
Dominique K. Numakura, This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
DKN Research, www.dknresearchllc.com
DKN Research Newsletter #1514, May 17, 2015 (English Edition)
(Micro Electronics & Packaging, www.dknresearchllc.com )
For the archives, visit www.dknresearchllc.com/DKNRArchive/Newsletter/Newsletter.html
Headlines of the Week
1. Asahi Glass established a complete manufacturing process of glass substrate in China to meet growing demands for TFT-LCD panels.
2. Showa Denko will expand manufacturing capacity of high purity hydrogen fluoride gas for etching semiconductors.
3. Citizen Electronics developed an LED device, “COB Series Version4,” said to have the highest conversion rate as a lighting source for outside use.
4. Toppan Printing will invest $20 million in its Shanghai plant to increase manufacturing capacity of photo masks to meet higher demand by semiconductor manufacturers in China.
5. Sharp commercialized a new large size (80") touch LCD display called “BIG PAD PN-L803” with comfortable touch and writing.
6. Mitsubishi Chemical contracted with Suny Polytechnic Institute in New York for the evaluation of next-generation CMP cleaning regent.
7. Solar Frontier (Major photovoltaic cell supplier in Japan) 4/30
Has agreed to supply CIS base thin film photovoltaic cells to Konar Energy in Turkey for 23MW class solar energy generator.
8. Mitsubishi Electric will roll out the new power semiconductor module series “DIPIPM+” as the controller of the air conditioning equipment.
9. JSR agreed to found a JV with Imec, leading institute in Belgium for development of next generation photoresist for EUV lithography.
10. Seiko agreed to found a joint venture with Seiko Instruments for manufacturing semiconductor devices, especially analog devices.
11. DeNA decided to found a JV with ZMP to develop automatic driving technologies for robot taxi cabs.
12. Oki Circuit Technology (Major PWB manufacturer in Japan) 5/12
Has established copper coin process for high layer count multi-layer board. The process makes the heat sink capability of the boards 20 times higher.
Recent Articles of DKN Research
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