Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1221561
MARCH 2020 I PCB007 MAGAZINE 39 more. But overall, I would say it's somewhere in the 10–15% range. Johnson: This line of thinking inside this con- versation raises the question, "Where's the big- gest payoff for drill technology, as far as adding profitability to the fabricator?" Part of it could be how you pre-engineer together that design you're running through a drill, and part of it could be operational expenses for things like being smarter with your use of consumables on the drills and being more configurable, or the capacity or maybe labor. Where is the big- gest bang for the buck for the fabricator to mo- tivate them to rework the drill department and automate? Palmer: I think it's the labor opportunity. At the end of the day, that's what you're talk- ing about. As we mentioned, on average, it's a year and a half payback on these machines. That's a huge profit enhancement right there. The better tool management to increase your tool's life and reduce the number of hits you get on the tool is nice, but it's the same bang for the buck that you get with automation and labor savings. Holden: A lot of the yield loss is handling, which is labor. Matties: As we hear more and more about HDI and a lot of people saying, if you're not doing HDI, you're about to be doing HDI, and lasers play a role in that. Do you see an interest in HDI capability in their product of- ferings? Palmer: Absolutely. We have more than two types of laser drills. We have what we call the CombiDrill, it is our UV/C0 2 dual laser drill, which, for the most part, is used in micro- vias. We also have PicoFlex and PicoµDrill series lasers. We supplied a PicoFlex series laser to the North American market where they're going to do routing with that. But when you talk about microvia formation, our largest, fastest-growing product line is our CombiDrill laser in North America. Matties: People are investing in this technol- ogy. The market demands are there for them to make the investment. Palmer: That's true. That's where we see the most rapid changes right now. Johnson: Where do you see the product road- map going in the next couple of years? Palmer: That's a great question. Thomas can answer that. Thomas Kunz: In general, we see registration for high-level applications and automation for mass production to be the main drivers in the world market. In registration, there will be a vertical integration of data flow through all rel- evant processes. In automation, we talk not only about physical automation but also the automation of data flow as the topic for the next years to come. Johnson: Thanks for joining us today. Palmer: Thank you all. Crowe: Thank you very much. PCB007 Thomas Kunz