Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1305670
44 SMT007 MAGAZINE I NOVEMBER 2020 dancy. When a contract manufacturer looks at us and says they have multiple inspections like SPI, solder paste, and they have different inspection processes. When it comes down to electrical intermediate test or some assembly test, there is a lot of redundancy. They're look- ing at their cost on the line, and they are get- ting shocked by the amount of cost that is just in test. Honestly, this tool has helped us QC the test process even better. When we are deploy- ing a test set, we don't test a revised product. Most times, it's developed and deployed. And when we deploy a test set anywhere in the world, it is a lot easier to know that you have a stable, robust, test solution going out into the field before the manufacturer inherits it and then finds problems. When you try and deploy something to fix it in the field, let's face it, it is really difficult. We do a lot of work with a customer down in Texas, a military-aero- space group, and they live and die by the feed- back we can give them and share. We are able to use some of Aster's tools as an intermediate process. Before we go and fix their build, we ask the customer what is their predicted cov- erage? By adding this model, could we get bet- ter coverage? The answer is either, yes, we did or find out that there's no value added, so you do not. There are some intermediate steps. If you embrace the technology for what it's meant to be, there can be a huge value. And what we saw with this tool is a lot of the manufacturing tools that play in the same arena as our partner are similar. But they're looking at it from a pro- duction point of view, not a test point of view. What master do you serve? The production or the test? Test is where I put my head down at night. That's who we want to embrace, so we're going to be very test-centric versus some of the other tools out there that are more about production. And it's not going to give us the same value for test people. It's not to say that the tools are inferior, it's just they have a different spectrum that they're servicing, and we distinctly feel that the other tools wouldn't give us the same value. This has given us value with some reporting mech- anism. And let's face it, when you catch an issue earlier, not only on your production line, but in the test development or design world, the value is to go back and say, "You have a problem." You can have a report say, "Fix this." Johnson: Will, who's your ideal customer? Webb: Our ideal customers could be different. As I said, we can have CMs. They can be an ideal customer, where they're just looking to reduce their slip rate out the door and need a way to do that, so they come to us looking for a solution. On the other hand, it could be an OEM design house or group that's doing designs, and they just want to get better at their testability. They recognize that they're not able to fully test the board, and they're looking at solutions that would help them get to a bet- ter testable product. They equally could come