Design World

  • Home
  • Technologies
    • ELECTRONICS • ELECTRICAL
    • Fastening • joining
    • FLUID POWER
    • LINEAR MOTION
    • MOTION CONTROL
    • SENSORS
    • TEST & MEASUREMENT
    • Factory automation
    • Warehouse automation
    • DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION
  • Learn
    • Tech Toolboxes
    • Learning center
    • eBooks • Tech Tips
    • Podcasts
    • Videos
    • Webinars • general engineering
    • Webinars • Automated warehousing
    • Voices
  • LEAP Awards
  • 2025 Leadership
    • 2024 Winners
    • 2023 Winners
    • 2022 Winners
    • 2021 Winners
  • Design Guides
  • Resources
    • Subscribe
    • 3D Cad Models
      • PARTsolutions
      • TraceParts
    • Digital Issues
      • Design World
      • EE World
    • Educational Assets
    • Engineering diversity
    • Trends
  • Supplier Listings
  • Advertise
  • Subscribe

High-Speed Digital Materials for Sequential Lamination Technology Gain Momentum

By Frank Tobe | April 23, 2014

Isola Group S.à r.l., in the market of copper-clad laminates and dielectric prepreg materials used to fabricate advanced multilayer printed circuit boards (PCBs), announced that I-Speed has been endorsed by two leading companies as the laminate of choice for PCBs using sequential lamination technology, requiring high conductive anodic filament (“CAF”) reliability and improved, cost effective signal integrity.

Isola

Today’s PCBs requiring sequential lamination are increasingly complex to fabricate. This manufacturing process is necessary when the design of the interconnect system has connections that are not required on all layers or that if made available on all layers, would affect the system’s performance or create an unsolvable congestion in the design. Boards requiring sequential lamination must be able to withstand multiple reflow cycles at high assembly temperatures.

Steve Robinson, President and CEO of APCT, stated, “Material choice is a critical factor in the success with sequential lamination designs. At APCT, we rely heavily on I-Speed materials from Isola. Other laminates fail after only a couple of cycles, whereas I-Speed demonstrates excellent performance even after several lamination cycles. At APCT, any product requiring more than two lamination cycles automatically defaults to I-Speed.”

Lee Ritchey, President of Speeding Edge, a training and consulting firm specializing in high-speed PCB and system designs, stated, “We had an independent fabricator build identical signal integrity test vehicles on competitive materials on boards designed by our company. At Isola’s request, we had the boards tested for insertion loss at our labs. The results proved I-Speed to be the best in its class for signal integrity.”

Fred Hickman, Isola’s Senior Director of High Speed Digital Products, commented, “I-Speed has demonstrated superior sequential lamination performance versus the competition. A large multinational fabricator, for example, succeeded on its first 1+8+8+1 HDI build with I-Speed, after failing multiple times with a competitive product.” Hickman added, “CAF is another area where I-Speed delivers best-in-class performance; it has successfully passed 0.65 mm pitch on an industry-standard test vehicle, as well as the high density product users group (HDPUG) test vehicle after 6X reflow at 260˚C. It also passed the 0.8 mm pitch thermal requirements on both designs without any issues after 6X reflow at 260˚C.”

I-Speed comes standard with VLP-2 copper with an approximate 2-micrometer (μm) surface roughness (Rz) without cost premium. I-Speed is in the same UL family as Isola’s IS415, FR408 and FR408HR materials. Processing of I-Speed is very similar to processing Isola’s FR408HR materials. I-Speed offers much lower Z-axis expansion, improved thermal robustness in lead-free assembly and at least 15 to 25 percent more bandwidth (lower insertion loss) than competitive products.

I-Speed production is scaling up at Isola’s manufacturing facility in Chandler, Ariz. The company plans to transfer production to one of its two facilities in Taiwan to support the demand for the product in a number of next-generation, high-speed digital designs, for supercomputers, servers, routers, storage equipment and lower-end RF applications.

Tarun Amla, Isola’s Executive Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, commented, “We are pleased that APCT and Speeding Edge have endorsed I-Speed’s thermal performance, CAF mitigation, sequential lamination and signal integrity. This material is a cost effective, efficient solution for many of today’s advanced PCBs.”

Isola
www.isola-group.com

You Might Also Like


Filed Under: Material handling • converting, MORE INDUSTRIES, MOTION CONTROL
Tagged With: isola
 

LEARNING CENTER

Design World Learning Center
“dw
EXPAND YOUR KNOWLEDGE AND STAY CONNECTED
Get the latest info on technologies, tools and strategies for Design Engineering Professionals.
Motor University

Design World Digital Edition

cover

Browse the most current issue of Design World and back issues in an easy to use high quality format. Clip, share and download with the leading design engineering magazine today.

EDABoard the Forum for Electronics

Top global problem solving EE forum covering Microcontrollers, DSP, Networking, Analog and Digital Design, RF, Power Electronics, PCB Routing and much more

EDABoard: Forum for electronics

Sponsored Content

  • Widening the scope for machine tool designers with FORTiS™ enclosed encoder
  • Sustainability, Innovation and Safety, Central to Our Approach
  • Why off-highway is the sweet spot for AC electrification technology
  • Looking to 2025: Past Success Guides Future Achievements
  • North American Companies Seek Stronger Ties with Italian OEMs
  • Adapt and Evolve
View More >>
Engineering Exchange

The Engineering Exchange is a global educational networking community for engineers.

Connect, share, and learn today »

Design World
  • About us
  • Contact
  • Manage your Design World Subscription
  • Subscribe
  • Design World Digital Network
  • Control Engineering
  • Consulting-Specifying Engineer
  • Plant Engineering
  • Engineering White Papers
  • Leap Awards

Copyright © 2025 WTWH Media LLC. All Rights Reserved. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of WTWH Media
Privacy Policy | Advertising | About Us

Search Design World

  • Home
  • Technologies
    • ELECTRONICS • ELECTRICAL
    • Fastening • joining
    • FLUID POWER
    • LINEAR MOTION
    • MOTION CONTROL
    • SENSORS
    • TEST & MEASUREMENT
    • Factory automation
    • Warehouse automation
    • DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION
  • Learn
    • Tech Toolboxes
    • Learning center
    • eBooks • Tech Tips
    • Podcasts
    • Videos
    • Webinars • general engineering
    • Webinars • Automated warehousing
    • Voices
  • LEAP Awards
  • 2025 Leadership
    • 2024 Winners
    • 2023 Winners
    • 2022 Winners
    • 2021 Winners
  • Design Guides
  • Resources
    • Subscribe
    • 3D Cad Models
      • PARTsolutions
      • TraceParts
    • Digital Issues
      • Design World
      • EE World
    • Educational Assets
    • Engineering diversity
    • Trends
  • Supplier Listings
  • Advertise
  • Subscribe
We use cookies to personalize content and ads, to provide social media features, and to analyze our traffic. We share information about your use of our site with our social media, advertising, and analytics partners who may combine it with other information you’ve provided to them or that they’ve collected from your use of their services. You consent to our cookies if you continue to use this website.