April 15, 2009
IPC APEX 2009 Show Report - Smaller, Serious, Blockbuster New AOI Technology IntroMike Martel, US Tech Web EditorIPC APEX 2009 kicked off its exhibition on Tuesday at Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas, same venue as last year. The show is a lot smaller than in years past, but no less energetic and serious; folks expected it to be slow, but I heard little whining; what it is, it is, and the survivors from the fallout of the amazing shrinking electronics assembly industry are learning to cope, make do, and ultimately even prosper.
At close of day Tuesday, attendees (excluding exhibitors) numbered a little under 2500. Some exhibitors dropped out prior to the show, resulting in booth/exhibitor attendance about 88% of expectations, according to IPC’s Anna Garrido, Director of Marketing and Communications.
Still, the reduced numbers simply meant that attendees were more serious; there were substantiated reports of sales made on the show floor. Many customer or attendee meetings with exhibitors were pre-scheduled; folks coming out knew what they wanted to see, and whom they were scheduled to see.
As one would expect in a tight or recessive economy, there weren’t many new products to see – many companies have gutted their developmental staffs and put innovation on hold. Also, in a mature industry, there are normally few remarkable technological advances anyway –they show up few and far between.
Unless, of course, you drop a bunker-buster on the show like Koh Young Technology has done with their new 3D AOI system, a new class of machine so new that it doesn’t have a name yet, and boasting technology so off the charts as to literally make everything else out there close to obsolete. One wonders, why haven’t these folks gotten the message that you’re not expected to introduce revolutionary stuff like this while everyone else is hanging their heads?
Whereas virtually all other AOI systems employ black-and-white 2D imaging to detect defects, this new system uses a radical approach incorporating eight image-sensors, dual 2D and 3D imaging to do what most AOI systems cannot do – sense height of objects in the Z-axis. It effectively prevents what are known as ‘escapes’ and cuts down dramatically on false calls, able to sense tombstoned components, lifted pads, leads, and components, upside-down components, and so forth. The inner workings of the system are a radical departure from what’s currently being offered out there. This will be one to watch.