»Future Packaging« production line at SMT

For 13 years now the live manufacturing production line has been the biggest draw card of the Nürnberg SMT congress. In 2010, the joint booth »Future Packaging« Production Line was for the first time organized by Fraunhofer IZM’s Smart System Integration Application Center. Titled »Medical electronics – technological and logistical challenges in component manufacturing«, 30 exhibitors from industry and research showed how modern component manufacturing can meet the requirements of medical technology.

Medical technology is an interesting market for electronic components, both technically and commercially. Innovation is a top priority in this area, with about a third of products having hit the market within the last three years. Live demonstrations on the production line gave visitors a taste of all that the modern circuit board has to offer this area of industry. For example, the embedding of components in a circuit board’s intermediate layer has been drawing a lot of attention recently, as it provides for a higher degree of miniaturization, improved reliability and better high frequency characteristics. IZM scientists Christine Kallmayer and Erik Jung explained the manufacturing process and the equipment requirements to approximately 1200 visitors over the three-day event. Some lucky few even got to take home a customized circuit board fresh off the production line!