Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1161956
SEPTEMBER 2019 I SMT007 MAGAZINE 51 there shouldn't be a lot of back-and-forth com- munication between you and your supplier. We've had some demonstrations with complex assemblies showing that you can manufacture a complex multilayer board with a single IPC- 2581-format data file. From the technology side, e-textiles is a hot topic we have been working for a few years. IPC will release the first standard for e-textiles— IPC-8921—in Q4. IPC-8921 covers woven and knitted e-textiles materials. We are also work- ing on a guideline for connections for e-tex- tiles—a design standard for printed electron- ics e-textiles and standards for e-textiles for wearable applications (e.g., medical, sports, health monitoring, personal protective equip- ment). This is an active area for IPC, and we are engaging the e-textiles industry to continue progress. For the automotive area, we have a couple of different efforts that support market segments. We've done a number of activities in support of space and aerospace for some of our stan- dards. We've been active in supporting the automotive industry—initially their needs for high-reliability, low-cost products in the PCB area. We started out with an addendum to IPC-6012. We then moved into a draft docu- ment, which we hope will be released by the end of this year for press-fit pins in press-fit pin applications for use in printing circuit boards. We have an active group in that area. In assembly and soldering, by IPC APEX EXPO 2020, we expect to release an addendum document that will customize two of our most popular standards—IPC-A-610 and J-STD-001— for the automotive industry. We've had some influential automotive companies, such as Bosch and Continental, participating, and I'm looking forward to seeing that release next year. And because of our collaboration in the wire harness area and WHMA, we are looking at wire harness standards that support electric mobility and electric vehicles. We have an ini- tial effort being kicked off that's intended for wire harness for high-voltage applications, so that's another new activity. The last activity to mention is that for data transfer, materials declaration, REACH, and conflict minerals, we have a series of standards for in the IPC-175X series that address compa- nies' needs for data transfer in the electronics manufacturing space. We have an active group of companies helping to make it easier to col- lect and report on the information that the supply chain is requesting. There's no lack of activity. And by the way, most of these efforts are European-led global efforts with the chairs and leadership mostly from Europe. Johnson: That's a large list. I was going to ask you how active the standards definition pro- cess currently is at IPC, and after going through that list with you, it has to be incredibly active. Bergman: Yes, we have an active group. We've been challenged for years to find a way to become relevant to the automotive indus- try; it's not from lack of trying. Right now, we have a stable staff with 11 technical depart- ment employees at headquarters in the Chi- cago area. We also have more than 200 com- mittees and task groups. We currently have 41 standards projects in the pipeline as well as 44 translation projects that are being worked on. All of that is supported by our standards team based out of Chicago. In Europe, we have one staff member sup- porting some of the European-led efforts, and he's based in Estonia. That works very effec- tively for us. As we have more European-led committees, we will add additional staff there. In China, we have three staff members located in different cities. They currently have almost 30 active projects and 350 volunteers. If we Yes, we have an active group. We struggled for years to find a way to become relevant to the automotive industry; it's not from lack of trying.