OTHER ELECTRONICS & NANOTECHNOLOGY
UPDATE
McIlvaine Company
(www.mcilvainecompany.com)
September 2013
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Brooks Instrument Invests in California Technology Development Center
Puracore Wins Dutch Cleanroom Contract
Cleanroom Will Give the Gift of Sound
Nanolab Technologies Acquires FIB Lab
Singapore Aims to Boost High Value Manufacturing
Ultratech/Cambridge NanoTech Branches Out in Massachusetts
Brooks Instrument, a provider of advanced flow, pressure, vacuum and level solutions, has made a new investment in its technology center in Irvine, California. The facility has been fully equipped with gas lines and test equipment at every workstation and in labs for characterizing gas and liquid flow instrumentation to facilitate research.
The goal of Brooks’ 10,000-square-foot Technology Development Center is to provide strategic focus on understanding, evaluating and developing cutting-edge solutions for its customers. “Innovation has been a key driver for Brooks delivering leading technology to the marketplace and will enable us to continue growing,” said Bill Valentine, chief technology officer for Brooks Instrument.
In an effort to develop best-in-class products and technology breakthroughs, the Technology Development team will collaborate with Brooks’s engineers in Hatfield, Pa., and in Ede, The Netherlands, to cultivate key next-generation components such as sensors, valves, and signal processing algorithms. The team will also coordinate the integration of research, concepts, and prototypes into new product development projects.
“The Irvine facility will allow us to strengthen our relationships with the research and technical community, many of which are in close proximity in the Silicon Valley, to produce the diagnostic and control devices they require, “said Valentine.
Puracore enters the Danish market place with a contract for a Puracore Plus cleanroom for a large micro-electronics manufacturer in conjunction with the Cleanroom Combination Group.
The cleanroom which is >600m2 (6,456 sq, ft,) will be used for manufacturing component parts for microelectronics machinery used in the production of wafer fabrications. The cleanroom will utilize the Puracore Plus range of components with some specific modifications developed specifically to meet the customers’ requirements.
The cleanroom will incorporate a double ceiling created using a grid ceiling and an insulated ceiling to create a plenum for air filtration purposes, as well as a number of flush fitting vision panels and doors.
In addition this will be the first cleanroom with the new Puraflex jointing system, which uses a flexible ridged tongue between panels to improve the air tightness of the joints without the requirement for silicone sealant, perfect for the electronics industries.
Campbell Newman, Premier of Queensland, with Cochlear Limited CEO, Chris Roberts, at the official opening of the new state-of-the-art microchip processing operation at Cochlear Limited’s Brisbane facility.
A microchip processing operation has opened at Cochlear Limited’s facility in Brisbane, Australia, which will continue to bring the gift of sound to clients worldwide.
This high-tech innovation, housed in a new cleanroom, is a key part of a $3 million upgrade of Cochlear’s facilities in Queensland and plays a major role in growing the company’s manufacturing capabilities. The Cochlear facility, makers of several hearing aids, will use the room to bond wires a fraction of the size of a human hair to microchips.
Cochlear CEO Chris Roberts described the new cleanroom, which is used for the manufacture of electronic components, as an integral part of the company’s local operation.
“These products go into the external components of our cochlear implant systems – essentially the sound processing ‘brains’ of our products,” Roberts explains. “Indeed, they will be going into the world’s most advanced cochlear implant system, the Nucleus 6, which we have recently launched.”
The Nucleus 6’s Sound Processor works with the client’s cochlear implant to transfer sound to the ear.
“Government support for both manufacturing and healthcare is critical, both for businesses like ours and for Australia. The Queensland government’s recent increase in funding for cochlear implantation in this state is testament to the support it is providing.
This high-tech innovation, housed in a new cleanroom, is part of a $3m upgrade of Cochlear’s facilities in Queensland and will play a major role in growing the company’s manufacturing capabilities and support its ongoing global expansion.
Cochlear, headquartered in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, specializes in the manufacture of implantable hearing solutions.
Around 200 people are employed at the Brisbane facility, with more than 400 different types of products produced each year through a combination of high-tech automation and painstaking manual micro assembly work.
The firm says this product’s availability in Australia will depend on regulatory approval, which is expected during the year. The rollout is underway in Europe after its sale in the region was recently approved.
Nanolab Technologies Inc. has acquired FIB Lab Inc., an analytical lab that supplies Focused Ion Bean (FIB) Circuit Edit services to the semiconductor industry. The acquisition continues the growth path set by Nanolab, which opened its new state-of-the-art analytical services laboratory in Silicon Valley in 2011, a second lab operation at the Center for Nanoscale Science and Engineering in Albany, N.Y. in 2011, and has plans for a new Failure Analysis (FA) Center of Excellence to be located in Orange County, Calif.
FIB Lab will continue its operations in its current location until the completion of an advanced FIB Edit Center located at Nanolab world headquarters in Milpitas, Calif. Nanolab will acquire all equipment assets of the company and also hire several FIB Lab employees.
“This acquisition is the first step in our company’s plan to accelerate growth in key market sectors, leveraging the investments that we have made since 2007 in leading-edge analytical instruments and laboratory facilities,” states John P. Traub, President and CEO. “Strategic acquisitions will complement our current expansion plans for our Silicon Valley and Albany, NY, lab operations and our new Center of Excellence in Southern California.”
FIB Lab’s founder and general manager, Raymond Tang, says, “I am very pleased that we will now have the management and financial resources to keep pace with the changing requirements of advanced technology. The new FIB Edit Center at Nanolab will provide to our customers leading-edge services in sub-micron defect analysis.”
Nanolab Technologies completed the first phase of a multi-year expansion at CNSE NanoTech complex in 2011. Future investments by Nanolab at CNSE are planned in Q1 2014, including the creation of a new Center of Excellence for Surface Analysis to complement the company’s established microscopy and materials analysis businesses. The Centers of Excellence concept will gain momentum with the addition of the FIB Circuit Edit center in Milpitas and the Failure Analysis (FA) center in Orange County.
Nanolab Technologies provides knowledge-based analytical services for advanced microscopy, chemical analysis, electrical failure analysis, materials analysis, FIB circuit edit, and defect analysis to the semiconductor, solar, MEMS, LED, medical device, and other high technologies industries. A private, employee-owned company, Nanolab Technologies designed and occupies a 48,000 ft2 advanced laboratory in Silicon Valley to maximize the performance of leading-edge Extreme High Spatial Resolution instruments to meet the requirements of current and future technology nodes.
FIB Lab was founded to service integrated circuit design and magnetic head businesses. The company now provides FIB services for on-chip circuit modifications, decapsulation, and product failure analysis.
Micronit has recently expanded its cleanroom facilities both in space and equipment. This is a result of a growing order portfolio and the introduction of new production techniques.
With these additional cleanroom facilities, Micronit can now easily meet the demands and expectations of today and those of the future in the fields of Microfluidics and MEMS.
Micronit has over a decade of experience in the microfluidics market, serving its customers from design to prototyping to manufacturing.
The unique approach of Micronit based on microfluidics and application know-how, high quality standards and its production facilities has lead to many satisfied customers.
“Micronit is driven to produce innovative and custom based microfluidic components, allowing our clients to break-through in new markets successfully. Our ambition to grow is supported by the High Tech Factory which offers flexible, high-tech infrastructure closely linked to MESA+, a community of over 500 people active in micro- and nanotechnology", says Ronny van ‘t Oever, Director and co-founder of Micronit Microfluidics.
The engineering department of the National University of Singapore has partnered with A*STAR's Singapore Institute of Manufacturing Technology (SIMTech) to establish two joint research labs in precision motion systems and industrial robotics.
The 'Joint Labs' collaboration, which aims to boost productivity for high value manufacturing in the medtech, aerospace, marine & offshore and precision engineering sectors, are launched in conjunction with the Industrial Robotics Research program of A*STAR. The multi-disciplinary venture will build on existing robotics capabilities across local research communities, including Institute for Infocomm Research and Nanyang Technological University, to advance capabilities and platforms.
The manufacturing industry is a significant pillar of the Singapore economy and contributes close to a quarter of its GDP. In recent years, the industry is facing problems such as increasing labor costs, lack of skilled labor and low productivity. Joint Labs will try to address these issues through the development of appropriate technologies for the above mentioned sectors where automation is currently lower compared to automotive and semiconductor manufacturing.
Several outcomes are expected from the research collaborations. For industrial robotics, an easy-to-use human-robot interface, with more than 50 per cent reduction in teaching and programming time compared to current robotic programming platforms, will be developed to propagate the application of robots in manufacturing. For the aerospace industry, characterized by large work pieces, high precision and better surface finishing, the Joint Labs aim to develop a reconfigurable robot work cell for flexible redeployment. It is projected that the marine & offshore industry can benefit from more than 50 per cent productivity improvement in robotic welding and weld inspection systems.
In the area of precision motion systems, the technologies for high-speed and high-precision linear motion stages, wide-format roll-to-roll machines, and multi-axis nanopositioning systems will be developed. These will help local companies build high-end machines and complex equipment for high value manufacturing.
Ultratech, a supplier of lithography, laser-processing and inspection systems used to manufacture semiconductor devices has moved Ultratech/Cambridge NanoTech to Waltham, Massachusetts.
The new state-of-the-art facility will expand its operations for next-generation atomic layer deposition (ALD) equipment development and enable leading-edge scientific research.
After acquiring the assets of Cambridge NanoTech last December, Ultratech invested in a new facility to enhance ALD development. With this new facility, Ultratech/Cambridge NanoTech has now greatly enhanced its capability to develop innovative process technology for ALD applications.
ALD is an enabling technology which provides coatings and material features with significant advantages compared to other existing techniques for depositing precise nanometre-thin films.
This technology is expected to be in high demand in volume manufacturing environments for integrated optics, micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMs), implantable devices in the biomedical sector and batteries and fuel cells in the energy market.
Ultratech Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Arthur W. Zafiropoulo states, "By creating a new state-of-the-art facility and leveraging the valuable Cambridge NanoTech intellectual property, we have further enhanced our ability to advance the development of next-generation ALD solutions. In addition, we have retained the same team that Cambridge NanoTech customers have worked with in the past. "
Zafiropoulo concludes, "The completion of the new facility marks our successful integration of the Cambridge NanoTech assets into Ultratech's nanotechnology product group. By investing in the expansion of these operations, we expect to generate increased revenue in new and existing markets. Ultratech, and our ALD unit, Ultratech/Cambridge NanoTech, will continue to focus on technology solutions that support our global customers' advanced product and technology roadmaps."
McIlvaine Company
Northfield, IL 60093-2743
Tel: 847-784-0012; Fax: 847-784-0061
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