IPC International Community magazine an association member publication
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58 I-CONNECT007 MAGAZINE I OCTOBER 2026 A M E R I CA N M A D E A DVO CACY Congressional appropriators and Pentagon officials invested in three new facilities: • Calumet Electronics opened a new facility in Michigan using DPA funds. • GreenSource received DPA funding to upgrade its production facilities. • TTM Technologies opened a new UHDI PCB manufacturing facility in Syracuse, New York, made possible by TTM investment and tax assistance from New York State and a grant from the Department of Defense for an extensive plant expansion. These DPA investments prove that we can compete, but their scale is inadequate relative to the capital being deployed across Asia. If advanced PCBs are foundational to U.S. economic and national security, can an investment strategy of tens or hundreds of millions compete with an Asian PCB expansion cycle measured in billions? We know that public action moves private capital. Policymakers should look to the CHIPS Act, which reinvigorated the American semiconductor industry by attracting more than $460 billion in private invest- ment. The same scenario applies to the American PCB industry. American PCB manufacturers are ready to scale up to reduce the dependency on Asia, but they need supportive industrial policy, legislation, and government investment to reshore and restore capacity. This is why PCBAA is on the ground in Washington, educating policymakers, legislators, and officials at the White House and Department of Commerce. A growing team gets better results, and we all have a role to play. From critical materials to fabrication and from assembly to OEM, every company in the PCB ecosystem benefits from smart industrial policy. We are only a few weeks away from electing the 120th Congress. PCBAA looks forward to working with our elected officials to confront the challenges we face and turn shared ambition into lasting progress. David Schild is executive director of PCBAA. To read past columns from PCBAA, click here.