Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1545206
JUNE 2026 I SMT007 MAGAZINE 29 climate and financial strain it's putting on custom- ers means we'll see more reshoring. For exam- ple, we will see an increased use of contract manufacturers. It doesn't mean that everything is coming back. We won't be making refrigerators in the U.S., for example. That will still be done in Mexico. But more cutting-edge stuff will be done in the U.S., in my opinion. Andrea, where do you see opportunities for growth on the global scale? Furnari: In HQ, we have visibility of all the busi- ness worldwide, and I can tell you that, for elec- tronic test products, the trend is to increase and improve the performance of the flying probes. We want the testers to be able to ramp in production to very high volume. We are increas- ing all the performance of the flying probe speed and overall performance with new motors, new drivers, and of course, greater accuracy. We're doing the same for the other ICT ma- chines. We will announce a new platform for the ICT bed-of-nails machine in the coming months. We now have a solution that allows testing in parallel, up to 32 boards at a time. This is a unique value in terms of test parallelism. This is some- thing that will be very interesting for the China and Southeast Asia markets. In our semiconductor division, we are investing in new AI technology. AI is growing very fast; we can also feel it in the electronic test products. Power is booming. Electric vehicle inverters and other automotive devices are moving into new high-power technology in order to have low battery consumption. Those are the main global trends and markets where we are focused. Testing generates a lot of data, which is an ideal environment for pattern-based analysis to deter- mine what's happening with process windows, etc. In SPEA's R&D work, how are you implement- ing AI into your solutions? Furnari: We created a dedicated team inside the R&D department. We started with pattern match- ing and the imaging processing. We now have a team that builds our neural network to test and avoid subjective results from the operator, and to develop a specific, scientific method that we train in SPEA HQ. We are also implementing AI across our software to automate operations based on algorithms. Soon, we will present something very disruptive. All our tests will be managed by AI software that can understand which test to run, how to design a new test product starting from the CAD file, and automatically generate the test program that you need. We are definitely moving in this direction. That sort of research and development work is probably setting you up for the next 50 years. People can look back 20 years from now and say, "Here's the second pivotal moment." Speaking of which, it's a great accomplishment in technology to have a half century of history. How will SPEA be marking the event? Furnari: The idea is to split the 50-year celebration into different moments. One is for the employees who have allowed us to reach this target through 50 years of working together. Then we would like to celebrate with some of our suppliers and custom- ers, who have worked with us a long time. We have ideas, but we won't disclose anything specific. We will be more precise in a couple of months. That's a great teaser. Readers should stay tuned to SPEA for more information later. Dustin and Andrea, thank you very much for your time. Furnari: Thank you so much. SMT007 Luciano Bonaria continues to play a vital role in the company as one of the main designers on the R&D team.