Leading European printed circuit board (PCB) manufacturer, Exception, has leveraged its value engineering expertise to reduce lead time on a client’s high specification board from 20 days to just seven. The client, Polish manufacturer Microtech International Ltd, is one of Eastern Europe’s most pioneering high tech organisations, providing software and advanced electronics solutions to the military and industrial sectors, among others. The company was recently placed 16th in a review of the 500 most innovative Polish companies of 2007.

Exception, based in Tewkesbury, UK, conducted a rigorous review of Microtech’s design requirements for the board prior to production. The company’s engineering designers were able to reduce its client’s costs and turnaround times significantly, without compromising the board’s performance.

“The original board design specified a 16-layer PCB with seven sub-stack bonding operations and a final eighth bond,” explained Gordon Holden, managing director of Exception’s PCB manufacturing division. “The inherent issue with this approach is that one can only determine whether or not the layers have successfully registered once the eighth bond has been applied, meaning that it can lead to high losses throughout the manufacturing process".

“In consultation with the client, our NPI technical manager, Mike Devine, was able to redesign the board layout using only 14 layers as opposed to 16 and using microvia technology to allow for greater interconnect density and reduce the amount of tracking required. Although the new approach involved spending three days on redesign, the time invested was more than recouped in the reduction of turnaround time from 20 days to only seven and with significantly higher output yields.”

Tomasz Englert, chief of advanced electronics for Microtech International, said that Exception had played a critical part in the project’s success: “Exception’s expertise and experience were invaluable in the successful delivery of this board within the timescale and budget we had assigned. By actively seeking the involvement of Exception’s personnel at an early stage of the board design, we were able to call on their assistance, advice and support to secure significant time and cost savings.”

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For further information please contact St. John White or Dermot O’Flynn at Prova PR on 01926 776 900.