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14 The PCB Magazine • August 2014 engines with various fuels, compression-igni- tion engines (i.e., diesel), battery-electric mo- tors, and steam. Each had sufficient advantages and disadvantages, and the situation was suf- ficiently complex when viewed from the per- spective of the times, that the winners were not easily predicted. Eventually (due to a complex combination of events, materials available at the time, and market forces) internal combus- tion (Otto cycle ignition engines, and compres- sion ignition) powered vehicles became the dominant types. Similarly, when the world needed products that were more complex, or more miniaturized than could easily or economically be produced by traditional hand wiring techniques, several plausible alternatives emerged, including depo- sition of conductive materials on an insulating substrate by printing or other techniques, auto- which may be employed in electronic fabrica- tion, when it is the most appropriate solution to a particular problem. Historical Background: How We Got Here As is typical with any major technological shift, when alternatives to wired circuits were needed, several possible paths were identified, but no one could predict with certainty which paths would succeed in the marketplace. The path (or paths) chosen depend on the technolo- gies and support for each available at the time, the various market, environmental, and societal forces in play at the moment, and a bundle of additional imponderable factors usually lumped together under the heading of "luck." As an illustration, consider the introduction of the automobile. Early examples of successful automobiles were powered by spark-ignition PRINTED ELECTRONICS 2014: WORLD STANDARDIzATION EFFORT continues figure 1: from "Printed circuit techniques" by cledo Brunetti and roger W. curtis (national Bureau of standards circular 468 first issued 15 november 1947).