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I-Connect007 Editor’s Choice: Five Must-Reads for the Week
February 23, 2024 | Andy Shaughnessy, Design007 MagazineEstimated reading time: 2 minutes

It’s not spring, but we must be getting close. It was 70 yesterday here in Atlanta, and I was able to wear a Hawaiian shirt, shorts, and sandals for the first time this year. If you’re wearing a Hawaiian shirt, you know it’s going to be a good day.
It was a good week in PCB design and manufacturing as well. In this week’s wrap-up, we have news about an uptick in EMS shipments in January, a look at the current M&A climate, some guidance on investing in your company in order to stay competitive, a primer on designing with embedded capacitance materials, and a roadmap for the industry to embrace sustainable PCBs in the future.
As many of you have told me at recent trade shows, it's a good time to be in this industry. Have a good weekend!
Catching Up With Industry M&A Expert Tom Kastner of GP Ventures
Published February 21
Dan Beaulieu recently interviewed Tom Kastner, our resident mergers and acquisitions expert. Here they discuss the current M&A climate, and whether CFIUS (the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States) regulations prohibit Chinese companies from acquiring U.S. tech companies. (Apparently, yes.) Check it out.
Standard of Excellence: Moving Into the Future by Growing Your Technology
Published February 21
Is your company growing every day? As columnist Anaya Vardya points out here, in this industry, if you’re not growing, you’re dying. In this column, Anaya discusses the need for fabricators to invest in their businesses, and he lays out a roadmap for this investment as well.
Beyond Design: Embedded Capacitance Material
Published February 22
More and more designers are working with embedded components. If you’re considering moving into this arena, you probably have a lot of questions. In this column, Barry Olney addresses many of your concerns about embedded, particularly regarding signal integrity and embedded capacitance materials. On the plus side, embedding components often provides better signal integrity.
North American EMS Industry Up 2.6% in January 2024
Published February 23
Our industry seems to be in a pretty good spot right now. At trade shows, company managers from all sectors tell me that they’re optimistic about the rest of 2024, and this news backs up that confidence. With North American EMS shipments up 2.6% over the same period last year, things are looking good.
Recycling PCBs: How NCAB is Navigating Challenges and Embracing Opportunities
Published February 22
There’s been a lot of talk about sustainability in this industry, and each year we see more environmental regulations designed to steer manufacturers into producing sustainable PCBs. But as Jan Pedersen points out, regulations alone won’t get the job done. In this article, Jan discusses some of the technologies that he believes will lead us into a world of fully recyclable PCBs.
Suggested Items
Takeaways from the Keynotes at the Edinburgh EIPC Summer Conference
06/16/2025 | Pete Starkey, I-Connect007It was seasonably wet and windy in Edinburgh, Scotland, June 3-4, where delegates from 17 countries convened for the 2025 EIPC Summer Conference to enjoy a superlative program of 18 technical presentations over two days, plus an excursion to a whisky distillery. EIPC President Alun Morgan welcomed everyone to the Delta Hotel, reminding us that in its previous iteration, it was the Royal Scot, traditionally the annual venue of the Institute of Circuit Technology Northern Symposium.
I-Connect007 Editor’s Choice: Five Must-Reads for the Week
06/13/2025 | Marcy LaRont, I-Connect007Today is Friday the 13th, and in much of Western folklore, this is a day when bad luck is lurking. But while Friday the 13th may top Western superstition charts, the global calendar is sprinkled with its own unlucky legends. In Spain and Greece, the bad juju lands on Tuesday the 13th—a day linked to Mars, the god of war, and naturally, chaos. In Italy, it’s Friday the 17th that is feared, thanks to the Roman numeral XVII, which can be rearranged to spell VIXI—Latin for “I have lived” (a poetic way of saying you’re dead).
Priority Software Appoints Ben Karniel as Chief Revenue Officer to Spearhead Global Growth
06/12/2025 | Priority SoftwarePriority Software, a leading provider of scalable and agile cloud-based business management solutions, proudly announces the appointment of Ben Karniel as its new Chief Revenue Officer (CRO), effective May 1, 2025. This strategic addition to the executive team underscores Priority's commitment to expand its global footprint.
Roll-to-Roll Technologies for Flexible Devices Set to Grow at 11.5% CAGR
06/11/2025 | GlobeNewswireAccording to the latest study from BCC Research, the “Global Markets for Roll-to-Roll Technologies for Flexible Devices” is expected to reach $69.8 billion by the end of 2029 at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 11.5% from 2024 to 2029.
Nordson Electronics Solutions Develops Panel-level Packaging Solution for Powertech Technology, Inc. That Achieves Yields Greater Than 99% for Underfilling During Semiconductor Manufacturing
06/11/2025 | Nordson Electronics SolutionsNordson Electronics Solutions, a global leader in reliable electronics manufacturing technologies, has developed several solutions for panel-level packaging (PLP) during semiconductor manufacturing. In one particular case, Nordson’s customer, Powertech Technology, Inc. (PTI) saw underfill yields improve to greater than 99% as they plan to transition from wafers to panels in their manufacturing operations. edwd