As it becomes more costly to push semiconductor technologies to new heights, companies are looking at packaging techniques to squeeze more circuitry into smaller housings. A growing number of firms are embedding passives and/or actives into printed boards, letting them attain high densities and high performance using less expensive chips.
Embedded components can save plenty of surface space for other devices, helping design teams improve performance and expand functionality without the cost of employing advanced chips. While one lure of embedded technology is that it relies on widely available components, it’s not simple to bury these devices inside a printed board.
This concept has seen fairly solid usage in compact handheld devices such as smart phones, but it’s still a relatively new technology in high reliability designs. Those who want to catch this new wave in system design will be able to learn much at the upcoming IPC/FED Conference on Embedded Components.
The conference lineup includes a broad array of speakers who come from diverse fields including manufacturing, design, and research. This diversity will give attendees a chance to understand the many factors that go into a high-reliability design.
Presentations will range from overviews to “deep dives.” Jürgen Wolf, assistant manager of research and development of Würth Elektronik will set the stage for the technology, discussing the current state of the art and future directions. Andreas Ostmann will build on this discussion with a longer-term view. He’s a group manager for embedding and substrates at Fraunhofer, IZM, Europe’s largest application-oriented research organization.
Together the pair will give attendees a good base for further discussions that go into greater detail on many different aspects of embedded development and production programs. Other speakers will focus on the design challenges that begin the process. For example, Wittenstein Electronics GmbH and FlowCAD are teaming up to explain how Wittenstein used FlowCAD tools to develop a new generation of electronic and software components for drive technologies.
“We will show the CAD flow which is needed to capture all relevant information for a design with embedded components,” said Dirk Müller of FlowCAD. “Using the description of the design project we did together with Wittenstein, we will explain the thought process, including the possibilities and alternative designs.”
Additional discussions of design issues will be presented by Per Viklund, director of IC packaging and RF at Mentor Graphics Inc.; Ralf Brüning, production manager for high-speed design solutions at Zuken; and Vern Solberg, a consultant at Invensas.
These design processes will have to be closely linked to the manufacturing capabilities that will be used to move the design into full production volumes. Mike Morianz, manager of advanced packaging technology and innovation at AT&S Österreich, will describe the solutions this international design and manufacturing specialist has examined. Other manufacturers will discuss the trend to move embedded technology beyond consumer applications.
“We are developing solutions not only for module embedding, which is driven by the mobile phone industry, but also for motherboard embedding and power embedding,” said Christian Rössle, vice president of sales and marketing, Schweizer Electronic AG. “This offers many advantages for automotive and industrial applications.”
