Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1212069
32 I-CONNECT007 I REAL TIME WITH... IPC APEX EXPO 2020 SHOW & TELL MAGAZINE Show Highlights The IPC APEX EXPO keynote by Burt Rutan was excellent. The entire hour was way too short, and Burt got a standing ovation when he finished. You can read a much more de- tailed account of the keynote in this issue. Fortunately, Burt spent 90 minutes in the I-Connect007 booth after his keynote, revealing more stories and answering more questions. That interview will be available very soon! I spent the rest of Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday attending technical paper presenta- tions, IPC Committee meetings, and walking the floor reviewing the exhibits. For me, the important meetings on the evolution of IPC- 2581 (DPMX) and IPC-2591 (CFX) were held on Monday and Tuesday. On Tuesday, I attended the Technical Ses- sions, where young engineers I know presented papers for the first time. I felt it was important to show our appreciation that new engineers to PCB fabrication and assembly were taking the time to contribute like this. The three ses- sions were on additive manufacturing, smart factories, and microvia testing. In between all this, I ran back down to the show floor to see more products. Wednesday was also very busy. Everything I deemed important was scheduled at con- current times, but I had a report to make, so the primary focus was on our IPC Committee to solve the problem of the weak microvia interface of stacked vias. The culmination of that free session will occur at the IPC High- Reliability conference in May in Baltimore, Maryland. We then had our closed WMI committee meeting to plan our next steps, test vehicles, materials, and test criteria to solve this tricky problem. Stay tuned for future reports. New on the Show Floor On the show floor, most new items were actually evolutionary and refinements of what we already have, but here are some things that stood out to me. Smart Factories Siemens/Mentor was at IPC APEX EXPO last year but had more demos this year. IPC- CFX had a more complex running demo SMT line. What was new was CIMnetics and the presentation of SEMI's smart factory stand- ards that have been used for the last 30 years by the semiconductor and LCD manufactur- ers. These are very process- and lithographic- oriented standards, which are ideal for complex multilayer and rigid-flex fabrication. Burt Rutan