CHAPTER NEWS

Region 10 Chapter Activity Round up

Malaysia Chapter hosted EMAP 2004 conference as a jointly sponsored event with IMAPS-Malaysia Chapter and IEEE Malaysia section from 5th to 7th Dec 2004 at Penang, Malaysia. Chief Minister of Penang Dr. Koh Tsu Koon inaugurated the gala event. Keynote lectures were delivered by Prof Rao Tummala of Georgia Tech Atlanta, USA, Dr. William Chen of IEEE CPMT Strategic Director, Region 10, Prof Andrew A Tay of National University of Singapore, Mr. Mustafa of Intel USA, Dr Raj Master of AMD USA, Prof K N Bhat of IIT Madras, India. About 107 papers were presented at the conference, which was well attended by 145 delegates.

Singapore Chapter arranged the 3-day international event of 6th Electronics Packaging Technology Conference from 8th to 10th Dec 2004 and 264 participants from 22 countries attended the event.

In addition to the technical program, the event included full-day Short Term Courses as under:-

i. "Solder Alternatives: Isotropic Conductive Adhesives, Anisotropic Conductive Adhesives and Non-Conductive Adhesives" by Prof K. W. Paik, Korean Institute of Science and Technology, Korea.

ii. "Lead-Free Soldering: Metallurgical Fundamentals Soldering Applications and Challenges" by Dr. N. C. Lee, Indium Corporation, USA.

Dr. Pey Kin Leong has also reported the following talks as part of their chapter activities.

(a) "Silicon Technology Scaling and ESD Reliability" by Dr. Natarajan
Mahadeva Iyer of IMEC, Belgium on 15th December 2004.

(b) "Ohm's law failure: New Insights into the charge transport in the multivally band of structure of Ga As" by Prof V. K. Arora on 5th January 2005.

(c) "Optically induced features in Polymer based Field Effect Transistors" by Prof K S Narayan, Jawaharlal Nehru, Centre for Advanced Scientific Research Jakkur, Bangalore on 12th January 2005.

(d) "Sky is the Limit: Multi-layer Three-Dimensional Integration Achieved by Wafer Bonding" by Mr. Chuan Seng Tan, Massachusetts Institute of Technology on 27th January 2005.

Hongkong Chapter has reported the new Executive Committee for the two-year term from January 2005 to December 2006 as under:

· Chapter Chair - Dr. Ming Li
· Chapter Vice Chair - Siu Wing Or
· Chapter Secretary - Wai Miing Cheung
· Chapter Treasurer - Run Fu

Dr. Ming Li has indicated their plans for a workshop in March, April 2005 and further short-term course on Packaging Technologies and Trends in Electronic Packaging for Global markets. The chapter would have active contacts with CPMT chapter in Mainland China and report their relevant technology level developments.

Dr. Lih- Shan Chen, Secretary of Taipei Chapter has reported the chapter executive committee for 2005 as under:

· Chapter Chair - Dr. Shen Li Fu
· Chapter Secretary - Dr. Lih -Shan Chen

Dr. Chen also reported having discussed the strategy for the development of membership of his chapter at the CPMT Luncheon meeting held during EPTC 2004 in Singapore on December 10, 2004.

The India Council Chapter organized a cosponsored (with IEEE Eds
Chapter and IEEE Bombay section) technical talk on 14th February 2005 by Prof Vikram L Dalal, Iowa State University USA who was invited as IEEE Eds Distinguished Lecturer. The topic of the talk was "The Photovoltaics Challenge: Role of Thin Film Silicon" and was well attended by about 10 IEEE members and about 40 students from IIT Powai.

As per the reorganization of the new chapter executive committee for the year 2005, Dr. Shankara Prasad of Inkroma E-Business Solutions, Bangalore stepped up to be the Chairman of the Chapter. Prof M. M. Shah has agreed to continue as Secretary/Treasurer of the Chapter and other Executive Committee members are Mr. I. M. Rao and Dr. Dhingra. Dr. Parikh would continue in the Executive Committee as Immediate Past Chairman.

Bangalore Chapter was inaugurated on 10th December in presence of Prof Madhavan Swaminathan of Georgia Tech, USA. The Chapter has organized a tutorial by Dr. P. R. Patel of INTEL on "Fundamentals of Packaging" bringing out the highlights of issues encountered in the recent past. The Bangalore chapter also organized an industry meeting where it was decided to organize an "Introductory Packaging Course" to be offered as a part of continuing education program at the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore. The chapter is working closely with Georgia Tech University to conduct EDAPS conference at Bangalore in Dec 2005.

--submitted by Dr. P. B. Parikh