Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/636678
38 The PCB Magazine • February 2016 the ink, the print heads, and the sur- face preparation. All of this should be integrated per- fectly. This is why Camtek decided to develop the ink, although this is not our core business. We believe that without mastering the ink it- self and having the ability to tweak the formulation of the ink and play with the print heads and the surface prepara- tion together in one system, it will be impossible to just buy the ink and print it. Matties: If someone purchases your system, are you the only ink supplier, or do they have a choice? Tzhori: At this stage, Camtek is the sole ink sup- plier, but this is not our intention. We under- stand that the market will look for companies that specialize in consumables. We are talking to everybody, and everybody is talking to us. We believe that once we are ready we will achieve a commercial advantage with the big players. After completing a very aggressive market- ing and promotional step, we are now at phase two, which is centered on qualifying the pro- cess. We have several installations worldwide and all our efforts are focused on passing these customers' qualifications and eventually their customers'. Matties: We're sitting here in China, where speed is a very big issue. Tzhori: It's a very big issue, and although we are exploring mass production solutions, at this stage we are not competing on the mass produc- tion lines. We know that we have to pass quali- fication of our customers and the end-user, and those qualifications are for small batches with quick turnaround. We want to be introduced to the market with as wide a customer base and end-user base as possible, but the current sys- tem is mostly suitable for quick turnaround and high-mix, low-volume needs. Matties: So, this equipment is well-suited for Eu- rope and North America at the moment? Tzhori: Yes, it's suitable for what we call mass production in North America and Europe, but it's also very suitable for a Chinese market. There are a few high-mix, low-volume produc- ers in China, and one of them is currently go- ing through the qualification process for our system. Secondly, we believe that any mass pro- duction producer would want to have one or two of these systems in order to reduce its pro- duction cycle time. The advantage that we have compared to the traditional process is an overall cycle time improvement for batches of less than 15 panels. So, although we are slightly slower in the actual printing, we are much faster in over- all cycle time. This is because we are offering a solution with fewer stations—neither exposure units nor developers are needed in the solder mask and legend processes because we're printing solder mask and legend in one station. We don't need to move the panel around. Final curing is half the final curing of the current process. If you are a mass production producer and you want qualification done by your customer, you don't need to use your high volume mass production to send the panel to your customer to be quali- fied. You use the Gryphon SL, ship it out in 24 hours, pass qualification and then move the or- der into your mass production line. We discussed this concept with many of our customers and everybody likes the idea and ev- erybody wants to try it. Actually, we have more demand than we wished for at the moment. We want to tightly control the amount of installa- tions at this stage and focus on qualifying the process and only then deploy the technology to the rest of the market. In addition, we are successfully experiment- ing with zero clearance and printing in clear- ances smaller than 100 microns; adding those capabilities to our existing system will open new opportunities and new markets for this amazing technology by allowing the Gryphon Amir Tzhori, vice president PCB (AoI) division of Camtek, China. CaMtek takes inkjet teChnology into the future