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18 I-CONNECT007 MAGAZINE I FEBRUARY 2026 F E AT U R E I N T E RV I E W BY N O L A N J O H N S O N , I - C O N N ECT0 07 R ebranding as the Global Electronics Associ- ation is not the only major change happen- ing at APEX EXPO this year. There's also a shift in the scope of the technical program as heter- ogenous integration and other advanced packaging methodologies come into the mainstream at both the component and system levels. We spoke with Matt Kelly, CTO and conference general chair, Devan Iyer, chief strategist for advanced electronic packag- ing, and Stan Rak and Udo Welzel, now in their fourth year as chairs of the Technical Program Committee, about what distinguishes the conference this year. Nolan Johnson: Matt, what is the vision of the Global Electronics Association for advanced electronic packaging (AEP), and how do you see that reflected in this year's technical conference? Matt Kelly: Nolan, this year will be important for the conference as we're making many changes. The first thing attendees will notice is we have shifted the name to the Advanced Electronic Packaging Confer- ence. This is synonymous with the messaging of sili- con-to-systems that we have been discussing for the past few years. In an engineering context, advanced electronic packaging is a well-known term and is synonymous Changing the Electronics Systems Conversation APEX EXPO 2026 Tech Conference