Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1183414
86 DESIGN007 MAGAZINE I NOVEMBER 2019 addressing new high-speed materials. Attend AltiumLive and listen to presentations on best practices for flex and rigid-flex design. Attend IPC APEX EXPO, and sit in on the session on semi-additive PCB processes. Attend your lo- cal IPC Designer's Council meetings or IEEE events. While you are at these events, introduce yourself and meet other people in the room who are interested in the same topic. There is an excellent chance that the people you meet will have knowledge you don't yet have, or they could learn something new from you. Don't forget to exchange business cards and connect on LinkedIn if that is your thing. This network of industry friends can be a great re- source when you need to dive into a technol- ogy that's new to you. At an event not that long ago, an indus- try friend was talking about an assembly is- sue they were having. I was listening with my fabrication mindset and realized that we were across the room from the material supplier. All three of us quickly huddled together, did a lit- tle brainstorming, and agreed on a few things that may be causing the issue. That, to me, is the power of networking with others in the in- dustry and expanding your resources. One con- versation provided options that days of emails would have had trouble accomplishing. In my opinion, both the pace of technology and the frequency of needing to rely on technol- ogy that's new to us to accomplish our goals is something that will be required at an increas- ingly fast pace, throwing us all out of our com- fort zones. By expanding our own knowledge when attending industry events, being willing to share our knowledge with others, and being purposeful about meeting others in adjacent segments of the industry, we can shorten the learning curve and ease into those new tech- nologies with more confidence. FLEX007 Tara Dunn is the president of Omni PCB, a manufacturer's rep firm specializing in the PCB industry. To read past columns or contact Dunn, click here. eos are going to have a place on our learning curves, and I challenge fabricators and suppli- ers to continue to create educational content that we can have available at our fingertips whenever the urgent need to answer a ques- tion arises. But I also think that we are going to have to rely more on each other and have dia- log about new processes, discussing both the challenges and the opportunities they afford. Let me share an example. I was recently told a "war story" about a "flex board that didn't flex." These stories are often some of my favor- ite stories, but this one was different. It wasn't a story of someone misjudging how stiff the flex would be with solid copper planes; this was someone using thin-core rigid material in place of flex materials. The board was for a wearable application, and the circuit would be attached to a patient's clothing. After some internet research, the team de- cided to use a flexible circuit, which would be their first flex design. As they continued re- searching flex materials, they also learned that rigid materials come with very thin cores, as well. They were used to that material, and any- thing only two or three mils thick should flex fine, right? Well, no. They ran through two different prototype versions before understanding that the mate- rial was not intended to be used in the man- ner they were designing it. At that point, they contacted a flexible circuit manufacturer and learned about common materials and what would best meet their needs. The good news was, once they moved to flex materials, the design worked perfectly! I share that story because it is so easy to make similar missteps. Today's world runs at break- neck speed, and it is easy to do a little, or even a lot of internet research, to think you fully un- derstand the concepts and then get caught by something that you hadn't learned yet. Thus, I challenge people to work on building their network. And I don't just mean the number of followers or connections on social media, al- though that has its place also. My challenge is directed at getting out, being active, and participating in our industry events. Attend an SMTA chapter expo with speakers