FTG to Acquire Holaday

TORONTO – Firan Technology Group announced on Dec. 28 an agreement to acquire Holaday Circuits, a Minnetonka, MN-based printed circuit board manufacturer focused on the aerospace and defense markets. Closing is subject to approval by US regulators and other customary closing conditions and is expected to take place in the first quarter of 2023.

Under terms of the deal, FTG will acquire 100% of Holaday for cash consideration of approximately C$24 million ($17.8 million), subject to typical closing adjustments. There is also an earn out provision of up to C$6 million ($4.4 million) based on future performance. Holaday had reported annual sales of over C$40 million ($29.6 million) in its audited financial statements prior to the pandemic, dropping to C$30 million during the pandemic.

Doosan Starts Work on New Flex CCL Plant

GIMJE, NORTH JEOLLA, SOUTH KOREA – Doosan in late December broke ground on a plant for manufacturing flexible copper-clad laminates. The company is investing nearly $50 million in the new campus, which is which is being built on a 13,000 sq. m. (140,000 sq. ft.) site.

According to the company, it will be complete in the second half of 2024.

Fastprint to Buy Ibiden’s Beijing Unit

SHENZHEN – Chinese PCB manufacturer Fastprint Circuit Tech will be acquiring a Chinese subsidiary of Ibiden, a Japanese PCB maker, at a price of JPY17.7 billion (US$129 million).

Fastprint will be financing the acquisition itself, and plans to bring new investors to the Beijing-based subsidiary while also boosting its development efforts and increasing investments to upgrade the production process and equipment, the company said in a statement.

Ibiden’s Beijing subsidiary has more than 1,300 employees and makes motherboards for leading smartphone suppliers, and its acquisition will open Fastprint to the high-end smartphone market and improve existing partnerships, the company said.

EV Consortium to Build Site in Ohio

WARREN, OH – The Mobility in Harmony Consortium, an initiative by Foxconn, will establish an Innovation Hub near Foxconn’s facility in Ohio.

The Innovation Hub will bring together global supply chain partners to share expertise and collaborate on electric vehicle (EV) and mobility projects, as well as new technologies and solutions for automakers. The plan for the effort is to accelerate EV innovation and revitalize American manufacturing by creating an EV ecosystem that spans the entire development process.

SwellFox Launches Educational Engineering Platform

BOISE, ID – SwellFox in January announced the launch of its educational engineering platform CircuitBread.com. CircuitBread aims to make electronics, embedded systems, and electrical engineering easily accessible to anyone – from the general interest hobbyist or student to the seasoned expert – through the creation and publication of free electrical engineering resources ranging from content to tools.

“At SwellFox, we share a passion for education. We ultimately uncovered a common desire to create a free, easy-to-use engineering platform for students and engineers of all levels. We wanted CircuitBread to be among the highest quality singular sources for people to become familiar with electronics,” said Joshua Bishop, CEO and lead engineer at SwellFox. “We bootstrapped the entire operation, drawing on our experience developing creative and marketing solutions for technology companies.”

FIT to Acquire Prettl SWH Group

TAIPEI – Foxconn Interconnect Technology has entered into an agreement to acquire Prettl SWH group, a German developer and manufacturer of sensor, connectivity and electrification solutions, as part of the company’s effort to expand its electronic vehicle development.

In a statement released by FIT, the company said it would be bringing Prettl wholly into its corporate umbrella as a subsidiary, and the 186 million euro ($198 million) acquisition should be completed by the second quarter of this year.

StenTech Acquires Advanced Tooling Design, Expands to California

CLEVELAND — StenTech in January acquired fellow stencil and fixture designer Advanced Tooling Design for an undisclosed amount.

ATD designs and manufactures stencils, tooling, fixtures and related accessories used in the electronics assembly industry, with applications across a range of end-markets. Headquartered in San Jose, ATD expands StenTech’s facility footprint into California, the largest market for stencil and pallet manufacturing in the US.

APCT to Buy Advanced Circuits

santa clara, ca — APCT has agreed to purchase Aurora, CO-based PCB maker Advanced Circuits from Compass Diversified for around $220 million.

The deal is expected to be completed in February and is subject to certain working capital and other adjustments. Compass expects to realize a pretax gain on the sale of Advanced Circuits of $100 million to $110 million. Net proceeds will be used to pay off outstanding revolver borrowings.

Technical Conference Program Set for PCB East 2023

PEACHTREE CITY, GA – The PCEA Conferences Task Group on Jan. 20 announced the technical program for PCB East 2023, featuring more than 60 hours of in-depth electronics engineering training.

Lee Ritchey, Rick Hartley, Susy Webb and Dan Beeker are among the headliners of this year’s show. The conference will be held May 9 to 12 at the Boxboro Hotel and Conference Center in Boxborough, MA. It features classes for every level of experience, from novice to expert. 

The scope of classes ranges from basics on design engineering and circuit grounding, to EMS, power delivery systems, board stackup, RF and flex circuit design and fabrication, thermal management, and materials selection.

In January, we welcomed the addition of Jacqueline Bress, our new events manager. She is a CMP (Certified Meeting Professional) with more than 10 years’ experience planning conferences and shows of all sizes, and is based in Georgia.

Committee Updates

Membership. Corporate membership is currently 15, up six from last month.

Mike Creeden and Mike Buetow were guests on the Altium OnTrack podcast on January 4. We promoted membership and the conferences, among other things.

Report: Sustainability, Mobility to Drive Semi Growth

Three-quarters (76%) of semiconductor executives expect the industry’s supply chain challenges to ease by 2024, yet companies need to be prepared to withstand other market pressures by focusing on investments that will help drive future growth, according to a new study from Accenture. The firm’s “2022 Technology Vision” report, based on feedback from 300 global semiconductor executives, found 45% believe the metaverse will have a transformational impact on their organization, and 90% believe it will be in the next four years.

“Traditional” vehicles are undergoing a renaissance, and autonomous vehicles could be mainstream for mass transportation by 2024, according to 32% of respondents. Some 41% of respondents indicated that almost a third of their capex/opex budgets are dedicated to sustainable programs. And 21% of respondents believe that increased health education and literacy is the most important aspect enabled by semiconductor innovation. 

Statistical Process Control Charts: Sampling Frequency, Subgroups and Plans

Taking the confusion out of determining appropriate data collection parameters. by PATRICK VALENTINE, PH.D.

In 1924, Dr. Walter Shewhart was working at Bell Telephone Laboratories. On May 16 of that year, Dr. Shewhart wrote a memorandum in which he presented and proposed the process control chart to his superiors. Bell Telephone Laboratories believed this memorandum gave it a competitive advantage and held this paper internally. In 1931, Dr. Shewhart published his book Economic Control of Quality of Manufactured Product. In this book, Dr. Shewhart explained in detail the fundamental concepts and benefits of statistical process control. This seminal work laid the foundation for the modern quality control discipline, and the process control chart became the bedrock of quality control systems.

The most critical assumption made concerning statistical process control (SPC) charts, i.e., Shewhart Control Charts, is that of data independence from one observation to the next (not autocorrelated).^1,2 The second assumption is that the individual observations are approximately normally distributed.^1,2 The tabled constants used to calculate the SPC chart limits are constructed under the assumption of independence and normality.

Flux, Reflow Ovens, NASCAR and Moonshine

The connection between flux and reflow ovens is obvious, but are there ties to stills and race cars too? by FRED DIMOCK

When my wife and I moved to Raleigh, NC, we soon realized we landed in the center of the universe for NASCAR fans. Richard Petty, Richard Childress, Dale Earnhardt, Junior Johnson, Dale Jarrett, Austin Dillon, J.D. McDuffee, Bobby Isaac and Rick Hendrick are a few of the well-known figures from NC. NASCAR race shops are all over the state. Towns such as Level Cross, Welcome, Kannapolis, Charlotte, Mooresville, Concord and Randleman are on every fan’s destination bucket list. Racetracks such as Bowman Gray, Charlotte, Rockingham, Asheville, Caraway, Fayetteville, North Wilkesboro, Orange County, Hickory, South Boston (VA), etc. are within a couple hours’ drive of our NC home.¹

Is Your Company Ready to Be Sold?

What owners should do to ensure an attractive price when they sell their company. by Bob Rossow

Protecting Connectors on Zero Edge Clearance Boards

Not leaving enough clearance is a design oversight that can have costly consequences. by Akber Roy

In Case You Missed It

Nanoscale Printing

“Curvilinear Soft Electronics by Micromolding of Metal Nanowires in Capillaries”
Authors: Yuxuan Liu, et al.
Abstract: Soft electronics using metal nanowires have attracted notable attention attributed to their high electrical conductivity and mechanical flexibility. High-resolution complex patterning of metal nanowires on curvilinear substrates remains a challenge, however. Here, a micromolding-based method is reported for scalable printing of metal nanowires, which enables complex and highly conductive patterns on soft curvilinear and uneven substrates with high resolution and uniformity. Printing resolution of 20μm and conductivity of the printed patterns of ~6.3 × 106S/m are achieved. Printing of grid structures with uniform thickness for transparent conductive electrodes (TCEs) and direct printing of pressure sensors on curved surfaces such as glove and contact lens are also realized. The printed hybrid soft TCEs and smart contact lens show promising applications in optoelectronic devices and personal health monitoring, respectively. This printing method can be extended to other nanomaterials for large-scale printing of high-performance soft electronics. (Science Advances, Nov. 18, 2022; https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.add6996)