Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1330321
JANUARY 2021 I PCB007 MAGAZINE 37 of the manufacturing base is essential going forward. Johnson: How would you characterize COV- ID's effect on your part of the industry? Hogan: It's interesting because the industry, and specifically our customer base, were far more agile than I expected. When COVID took hold, I thought, "Oh, we're not going to sell a machine for a year." With capital equipment, people want to run samples and tests, touch it and kick its tires. But our customers need the product so they're adapting and finding a way. We used a range of technology to con- duct demonstrations and produce samples and worked hard to maintain the same level of tech- nical support to the customer base. Our team worked hard to be sure the customer base was supported without being able to go into their facility. Everybody had to be flexible. All our customers, I believe, were very happy with all the things we did to keep them running, be- cause they're all essential businesses to us. Johnson: And that seems to be true for the whole industry. That's something that I would grab on for a 2020 retrospective point of view. The pandemic and social distancing pushed a lot of the manufacturing folks into taking ac- tion, finally buying in to smart factory, digital, etc. One argument is that because, for the fore- seeable future, they won't be able to put the same number of people on the manufacturing floor and as close together as before, you have to do something else. Hogan: Yes, with the staffing of the factory alone, how does that work now? What are the alterations? Are we going to go full automation now in the U.S.? I think one of the outcomes of our technology is to create more data channels so that the direct imaging system will process engineer itself. Regardless of what panel you are making, the entire process is controlled in an automated intelligent process. That's what Factory 4.0 is all about: trying to eliminate min- ute-to-minute engineering to make the whole process work as one. Johnson: The staff is moving from being opera- tors on the floor to being engineers on the carpet. Hogan: That's right, analytics. That's where it's at. Johnson: I've been asking, when is the analyt- ics industry really going to be able to take all of this data and turn it into something that is intelligible? Hogan: When you think about the cycle, data collection is inexpensive. Our product is infi- nitely upgradeable. This new technology of- fering we are releasing will be upgradeable to all 60 U.S. customers, for example. We see our mission as extending the useful life of tech- nology equipment. Further, once implement- ed, the process should improve the perfor- mance of plating, develop and etch. The buzz word of "artificial intelligence" requires data as an input to result in an intelligent process correction or output. The reason AI is vital is the ability to dynamically analyze data and react. 2020 will forever be known for COVID, but the side story may prove even more impactful in the long term: the shift of the public and the business world to rapidly adopt new technol- ogies out of necessity. Major shifts that would normally take decades have occurred in a sin- gle year. I will say it's an interesting time right now. Johnson: Brendan, thanks so much! Hogan: My pleasure, Nolan. PCB007 The reason AI is vital is the ability to dynamically analyze data and react.