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94 The PCB Magazine • December 2015 heavily with ENEPIG, electro palladium, nickel palladium gold, etc. We are into via fill and the electrolytic copper side. In the United States I think we have the biggest market share of via filling and the biggest market share of surface finish using ENIG and ENEPIG. And then we also have other products that we sell, like MEC products and the micro-roughening products in competition with black oxide. Goldman: Are these considered companions to your plating products? Milad: Well, they are in a way, as a replacement for black oxide and brown oxide in a conveyor- ized system. That is from a Japanese company called MEC, and we represent them. We also represent Umicore, which is the old Degussa from Europe. The Degussa products that we carry are mostly used in general metal finishing, so we service that market as well. We have a lot of new and exciting stuff, and we are making a lot of headway in the U.S. market. Goldman: And you've been with Uyemura for how long? Milad: It's hard to believe but I've been with Uyemura for 13 years. Before that I worked for Rohm & Haas and before that with Atotech. Be- fore Atotech, I was a manager with Automata (which became DDi) in Virginia. Goldman: Yes, back in the old days. That's where I first met you. Milad: Yeah, and you were with Enthone at the time and you were there to help out with some problems that we had. Goldman: Ah, the old days…So, you're here at SMTAI to talk about your IPC subcommittee's meet- ing results, I believe? Milad: Yes, I was presenting an update on what the subcommittee is doing, what they have completed, what they are working on and what they are looking to finish. The subcommittee is called Plating Processes, IPC 4-14. It is a sub- committee under the Fabrication Processes gen- eral committee. We've been very active since 2001 with Ge- rard O'Brien and myself as the co-chairmen. We've been there for 14 years. We've put out a number of specs—on ENIG, immersion silver, immersion tin, and we've put out ENEPIG. Goldman: You've been writing specs for the vari- ous processes for surface finishes? Milad: Yes, we've been writing the specs. And then we're finding as time goes by that we have to go back and revise them and add amendments and so on because things are constantly chang- ing. When we wrote ENIG initially in 2002, there was no lead-free on the horizon at all. So, now we have lead-free and we are revising the ENIG specification. We are putting new lower and upper specs that put limits on the gold. Goldman: ENIG stands for electroless nickel/im- mersion gold? Milad: Yes, and the Rev A will have a few new things in it. One thing it is going to have is a lower limit and an upper limit on gold thick- ness. Before we did not have an upper limit at all. So it's 1.6 to 4.0 microinches for the gold. Plus we are adding a corrosion chart. You know about nickel corrosion or "black pad." We are saying, "Here is a chart. If you see this, this is acceptable corrosion. If you see this, it is unacceptable corrosion." So the first spike of George Milad FeATure inTerview UYEMURA USA'S GEORGE MILAD ON UPDATING FINAL FINISH SPECS