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PLANO, TX – Rapid Tooling Inc. has relocated to a 14,310 sq. ft. manufacturing facility here.

The facility has more than 9,000 sq. ft. of manufacturing space.

Rapid Tooling provides wafer tooling and process tooling for components in JEDEC trays, router fixtures, solder pallets and SMT pallets, as well as press/fit tooling and placement equipment tooling. The company also provides numerous services for electronics and semiconductor packaging.

BANNOCKBURN, IL -- Some 29 representatives of US-based companies converged on Washington earlier this month, intent on explaining the circuit board fabrication and assembly industry to their legislators.

FUKUOKA, JAPAN – The World Semiconductor Trade Statistics forecasts the semiconductor market to grow 28.6% to $291 billion in 2010.

In 2009, the semiconductor industry was affected by the global economic crisis, down 9% to $226.3 billion. In 2010, the industry is recovering with revived enterprise and consumer spending, WSTS says.

The latest forecast is a more optimistic outlook for the year, with an increase of $44 billion over the fall forecast.

The industry is now expected to top $320.2 billion in 2012, with a three-year compound annual growth rate of 12.3% from 2009 to 2012.

CHESTNUT HILL, MA -- Already battered by the recession, manufacturers are concerned a wave of retirements across their industry will saddle them with a shortage of qualified job applicants, huge training costs for new workers and the challenge of transferring job knowledge from one generation of workers to the next.

TAIPEI -- Compal Electronics will raise wages at its plants in China as it tries to fend off inflation and a shortage of workers, the company says.

SHENZHEN -- Foxconn Technology Group, which only last week said it would substantially raise wages of its workers here, reportedly will relocate much of its manufacturing to other sites in China.

SAN JOSE – The Semiconductor Industry Association submitted a report to the US Department of Commerce outlining actions required to meet the goal of doubling semiconductor exports to $76 billion by 2014.

MILPITAS, CA – Thirty engineers and photovoltaic manufacturing professionals met June 10 at Flextronics Inc.’s campus in Milpitas, CA, to discuss the formation of a new professional association to advance the photovoltaic engineering and related manufacturing professions. The proposed association would address research, education, industry standards, and training.

Participants were welcomed by Flextronics vice president Dr. Dongkai Shangguan, who discussed the solar industry and stressed the need to lower the cost per watt.

Organizer Matt Holzmann, president of Christopher Associates, presented an overview of how an association would benefit the industry and the participants. He proposed a member-driven model dedicated to engineering, management and other professionals.

There was widespread agreement that such an association would have significant benefits both to the participants and the industry at large. Committees are now being formed to execute key functions in establishing a legal entity and its functions.

“This was a great first step,” Holzmann said. “We must now focus on defining the scope and activities of the organization. Member involvement is critical to achieving success.”

Contact Holzmann (matt.holzmann@christopherweb.com), Jasbir Bath (Jasbir@christopherweb.com) or Dennis Willie (dennis.willie@flextronics.com) for additional information.

ESSEX, MD -- A US-based investment group reportedly will acquire Jabil Circuit's subsidiary in Italy for an undisclosed sum.

MINNEAPOLIS, MN – Registration is open and the program for SMTA International is finalized and available online.

The conference will be held at the Walt Disney World Swan and Dolphin Resort in Orlando on Oct. 24 -28.

This year's program includes 20 courses, 130 technical papers, six new tutorials, and four focused symposia. Also, more than one hundred suppliers will exhibit Oct. 26 and 27.

SMTAI 2010 offers educational opportunities covering manufacturing and assembly, advanced packaging, substrates, soldering, and quality and reliability.

The technical conference includes an AIMS Harsh Environments Symposium this year. Other offerings include the Evolving Technologies Summit, Contract Manufacturing Symposium, and Lead-Free Soldering Technology Symposium.

Tom Sharpe of SMT Corp. will keynote: "Counterfeit Components Are Everywhere – What's Your Strategy?"

For more information and to register, visit http://www.smta.org/smtai.

SANTA CLARA, CA – First-quarter sales of notebook PCs grew to $31.1 billion, the largest single quarter since the third quarter of 2008, when notebook ASPs were more than 20% higher than at present, says DisplaySearch.

Although ASPs declined for desktop replacement notebooks, they increased for every other category, with double-digit jumps for mini-note PC/slate and ultraportable categories, according to the firm.

In the ultraportable market, a new crop of products that were launched in and around the January CES show helped push revenues up 6% sequentially, but they were still well below year-ago levels, as this category, which tends to be dependent on the enterprise market, continued to struggle.

Positive year-over-year revenue growth for the quarter was a result of strong mini-note PC/slate growth in Latin America and the Asia-Pacific, as well as continued growth in China and North America.

Portable class notebook PC Shipments surged compared to the same quarter last year in Asia-Pacific, China, and Latin America, easily passing average market growth rates for the segment. Shipments of desktop replacement class notebook PCs surged in Europe/Middle East/Africa and Japan, says DisplaySearch.

Shipment growth in the mini-note PC/slate category exceeded the average for the notebook market as a whole, but it appears the momentum is shifting from mini-note PCs to slates. In the fourth quarter of 2009, there were no consumer-oriented slates in the market, and the devices that did exist were targeted at small, vertical markets.

In the first quarter this year, Apple shipped almost 700,000 iPads into the channel, accounting for 6.5% of all mini-note PCs/slates.

In the first two months of the second quarter, the company sold more than two million iPads. DisplaySearch expects the iPad will continue to account for an increased share of the mini-note PC/slate segment in this quarter.

In the second half of the year, as additional slates are launched, the netbook could continue to lose share.

With the emergence of the iPad and other slates, the low-priced netbook segment of the market is transitioning from devices that, though smaller and less expensive, followed typical PC market trends that are built on Office suite applications and content creation to devices that provide the ability to create content.

CATANIA, ITALY – Partners in a new publicly-funded research project today announced details of a new 13 million euros program aimed at improving energy-efficiency of new products and technologies.

END – Models, Solutions, Methods and Tools for Energy-Aware Design is a three-year ENIAC (European Nanoelectronics Initiative Advisory Council) project designed to enhance the competitiveness of Europe's semiconductor and electronics equipment companies.

The project will pursue energy efficiency through a holistic approach that unifies, under a common design platform, modeling, simulation, design and EDA techniques for a range of devices and systems (digital blocks, analog/RF blocks, discrete components).

The project will also address the conception and experimentation of new power supplies, with particular emphasis on energy management aspects.
END brings together user companies (IDMs, fabless), design centers, universities and institutes in a range of projects that will establish standards and contribute to building a solid energy-aware electronics design base for Europe.

In particular, project goals include the development of power models for non-bulk CMOS devices, a unified low-power design methodology for heterogeneous systems and SoC (System-on-Chip) devices, energy-efficient building blocks for heterogeneous systems, energy-efficient IP components for SoCs, energy management of systems based on multiple, heterogeneous supplies, and demonstrators of solar energy and wireless sensor systems.

The project will cost approximately 12.6 million euros, with funding provided by both the ENIAC JU (Joint Undertaking) and public authorities of Belgium, Greece, Italy and Slovakia.

Project partners include STMicroelectronics s.r.l., Italy (project coordinator); Centro Ricerche FIAT, Italy; ETH Lab, Eurotech Group, Italy; Numonyx Italy; Consorzio Nazionale Interuniversitario per la Nanoelettronica, Italy; Politecnico di Torino, Italy; Alma Mater Studiorum - Universita di Bologna, Italy; Universita degli Studi di Catania, Italy; Universita degli Studi di Salerno, Italy; NXP Semiconductors, Germany; Intracom S.A. Telecom Solutions, Greece; inAccess Networks, Greece; University of Patras, Greece; ON Semiconductor, Belgium; ON Semiconductor, Slovakia; Slovak University of Technology in Bratislava, Slovakia; Acondicionamiento Tarrasense, Spain, and Centre Suisse d'Electronique et de Microtechnique, Switzerland.