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42 SMT007 MAGAZINE I APRIL 2020 will realize tens of billions of dollars in gains by 2022 after deploying smart manufacturing solutions. In an effort to facilitate the devel- opment and commercialization of the critical smart manufacturing building blocks (e.g., au- tomation, machine learning, or ML, data com- munications, digital thread), several countries established innovation institutes and large R&D programs. These collaborative activities seek to develop technologies that will improve traceability and visualization, to enable real- time analytics for predictive process and ma- chine control, and to build flexible, modular manufacturing equipment platforms for high- mix, low-volume product assembly. The vertical segments of the electronic prod- ucts manufacturing industry (semiconductor (SEMI), outsourced system assembly, and test (OSAT), and printed circuit board assembly (PCBA) are converging, and service offerings are being consolidated. This occurrence is due to the acceleration of technology development and the market dynamics, providing industry members in specific vertical segments an op- portunity to capture a greater percentage of the electronics industry's total profit pool. The convergence of the SEMI, OSAT, and PCBA segments will cause shifts in the flow of materials across the supply chain, as well as the introduction of equipment and processes across the segments (e.g., back-end OSAT ser- vices offered by PCBA segment). OSAT services providers are using equipment and platforms typically found in semiconductor back-end manufacturing, and PCBA services providers are installing equipment and developing pro- cesses similar to those used by OSAT. The ability to develop smart manufacturing technologies (e.g., big data analytics, AI, cloud/ edge computing, robotics, automation, IoT) that can be deployed within the vertical segments as well as between the vertical segments is critical. In addition, the ability to enable the technolo- gies to evolve unhindered is imperative to es- tablish a robust integrated digital thread. As the electronic products manufacturing supply chain continues to evolve and expe- rience consolidation, shifts in the tradition- al flow of materials (e.g., sand to systems) will drive the need to adopt technologies that seamlessly interconnect all facets of manufac- turing operations. The iNEMI Smart Manufac- turing TWG published a roadmap that would provide insight into the situation analysis and key needs for the vertical segments and hori- zontal topics (Figure 1) [1] . Figure 1: Horizontal topics across vertical segments.