Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1493016
124 I-CONNECT007 I REAL TIME WITH... IPC APEX EXPO 2023 SHOW & TELL MAGAZINE Article by Andy Shaughnessy • I-CONNECT007 T he second annual IPC Design Com- petition was held at IPC APEX EXPO 2023, and five contestants from around the globe battled it out for four hours—three contestants worked remotely and two competed live at the San Diego show. Out of the original 49 contestants who began the preliminary heat last fall, these five final- ists truly represented the cream of the crop. In the end, Sathishkumar Vijayakumar took home first-place bragging rights. Vijayakumar, a senior design engineer with Tessolve India, nar- rowly edged out Adam Thorvaldson, CID, lead PCB designer with Innovex Design Service. Third place went to Jesus Castane, CID+, senior PCB designer for CMR Surgical, while Paul Brionez, CID+, senior PCB design layout engineer at Wisk Aero, came in fourth. Harish G., senior engineer in R&D mobility at Exi- com Tele-Systems, took fifth place. Patrick Crawford, manager of design stan- dards for IPC, moderated the live event. All five competitors worked in the Altium Designer platform. This year's design—a hand-shaped rigid-flex circuit for a glove used in virtual reality or augmented reality gaming—was more difficult than last year's board for a simple blinking name badge. In fact, no contestant com- pleted the design, so the designs were scored based on the work completed and how each designer chose to approach the challenge. Sathishkumar Vijayakumar Wins IPC Design Competition Adam Thorvaldson Jesus Castane Paul Brionez Harish G.