Printed Circuit Design & Fab Online Magazine - Features

Features

The annual list of the largest contract assemblers proves looks can be deceiving.

To the uninitiated, a look back at the past few years of the CIRCUITS ASSEMBLY Top 50 would suggest the industry has been growing and at a strong pace. The last time the No. 50 entry on the list fell in terms of revenue was in 2011. And this year was the first where it required at least $300 million ($328 million, to be exact) to make the list.

How to treat every power distribution system as a custom design.

Are you losing sleep over power integrity on your boards?

If so, this is for you.

PCB manufacturing has come a long way in a hurry, as a walk through Electropac’s PCB Museum reminds us.

A highlight of a trip to Electropac’s printed circuit board plant in Manchester, NH, is the PCB Museum. In it, the company has dozens of photos and artifacts from 38 years of manufacturing. President and cofounder Ray Boissoneau allowed a PCD&F reporter to photograph some of the equipment and products during a tour in April.

Assemblers demand a complete CAD data package for more effective manufacturing.

Panelization, also known as the processing of boards in an array format, keeps small boards attached to each other within a single, larger substrate. Panelization is used to process multiple small boards through assembly, and is becoming more prevalent as board sizes shrink.

Printers are becoming more and more versatile. Now they can even print sensors and electronic components on 2D and 3D substrates. A new, robot-assisted production line allows the process to be automated.