- 04 April 2008 -
IPC Printed Circuits Expo 2008:
Day One Report From Las Vegas

Industry luminaries and noted authors received special recognition on day one of the IPC Printed Circuits Expo/APEX/Designers Summit, which kicked off in Las Vegas on March 29. The Association Connecting Electronics Industries (IPC) presented 50 awards across several categories. The awards were presented to individuals who made significant contributions to IPC and industry by lending their time and expertise to committees and standards and programs development. Following is a sampling of the winners:

Special Recognition Awards

∙ Mark Jankowski, MacDermid, Inc., for his leadership as chairman of the IPC PCB Suppliers Council Steering Committee.

∙ Constantin Choueiri, Sigma Circuits Design; Ruth Delker and Javier Jimenez, Dynamic Engineering Services; Scott McCurdy, Freedom CAD Services, Inc.; Debbie Nygaard, Honeywell, Inc.; and Glenn Wells, Techsville, Inc., for their support of IPC Designers Council activities.

∙ Scott Strand, IBM Corporation, for his leadership of the 9-82 Power Conversion Devices Subcommittee and this group’s efforts at generating the upcoming IPC-9592, Requirements for Power Conversion Devices for the Computer and Telecommunications Industries standard.

∙ Gerald Leslie Bogert, Bechtel Plant Machinery, Inc., and Nancy Chism, Flextronics, for the work they did to help make Revision B of IPC-7711/7721, Rework, Modification and Repair of Electronic Assemblies a leading-edge document.

Distinguished Committee Leadership Awards

∙ David Bieber, Assembléon, for his leadership as chairman of the SMEMA Statistical Subcommittee.

∙ Mark Jankowski, MacDermid, Inc., in recognition of his leadership as chairman of the Process Consumables Statistical Subcommittee

∙ Kelvin Low, SMtech Electronics, for his leadership of the Task Group Asia 5-24CN Assembly and Joining Materials Subcommittee that translated the electronics assembly standards, IPC-J-STD-004, -005, and -006.

∙ Edward Kelley, Isola Group SARL, for his leadership of the 3-12c Resin Coated Metal Foil Task Group that developed IPC-4563, Resin Coated Copper Foil for Printed Boards Guideline.

∙ Henry Sanftleben, Delphi Electronics and Safety, and David Vaughan, Taiyo America, Inc., for their leadership of the 5-33e Legend Inks Task Group that developed IPC-4781, Qualification and Performance Specification of Permanent, Semi-Permanent and Temporary Legend and or/Marking Inks.

∙ Peggi Blakley, NSWC-Crane Division, and Daniel Foster, STI Electronics, for their leadership of the 7-34 Subcommittee that developed Revision B of IPC-7711/7721, Rework, Modification and Repair of Electronic Assemblies.

Top Technical Papers

In addition to citing those serving on volunteer committees, IPC announced the winners of this year’s best U.S. and international papers presented at the conference. “Design for Manufacturability in Lead Free Wave Solder Process,” by Ramon Mendez, a process development engineer at Celestica, took the international best paper honor. Co-authors included Mario Moreno, German Soto, Jessica Herrera, and Craig Hamilton, all from Celestica.

Honorable Mention for International papers was given to Bev Christian, director of the Materials Interconnect Research Group at Research In Motion in Ontario, for “Ionic Analysis of Common Beverages Spilled on Electronics.” Assisting Christian were co-authors Alexandre Romanov, Research In Motion, and Cameron O’Neil, a student at Dalhousie University.

Brandon Gore, a signal integrity engineer working for Intel Corporation’s Packaging and Interconnects Group, won the U.S. best paper award for “Toward a PCB Production Floor Metric for Go/No-Go Testing of Lossy High Speed Transmission Lines.” Martyn Gaudion, Polar Instruments, shared in the honor as a co-author.

Two U.S. honorable mention awards were presented. Ning-Cheng Lee, Ph.D., vice president of technology at Indium Corporation of America, won the award for “A Compliant and Creep Resistant SAC-Al (Ni) Alloy.” Drs. Benlih Huang and Hong-Sik Hwang, Indium Corporation of America, co-authored the paper with Dr. Lee. In addition, Aaron Unterborn, senior engineering manager at Flextronics International, along with co-authors Ken Wilson and Charles Merz, also from Flextronics International, shared the honorable mention title for “Methods for Choosing a Saponifier or Surfactant for Printed Circuit Board and Stencil Cleaning Applications.”

More than 100 papers were submitted for consideration as a "best paper." Papers were evaluated on their technical content, originality, test procedures and data used to deduce conclusions, quality of illustrations, and the clarity and professionalism of writing. Each team of best paper authors will receive a $1,000 honorarium, and all authors will be presented with a commemorative plaque.

Copies of the winning papers are included in the 2008 Technical Conference Proceedings, which is available for purchase through the IPC Online Store at www.ipc.org/onlinestore. All five papers will be published in ReVIEW, a bimonthly publication distributed exclusively to IPC members. Members may also access the winning papers in the "members only" section of the IPC website.

For more information on these awards and the award recipients, contact Anna Garrido, IPC director of marketing and communications, at (847) 597-2804 or AnnaGarrido@ipc.org.