iNEMI strengthen collaborative efforts in China with the opening of its Shanghai office

Leaders focus on environmental legislation, miniaturization, reliability and quality

More than 100 leaders from the electronics industry participated today in the grand opening of the Shanghai office of the International Electronics Manufacturing Initiative (iNEMI), a worldwide industry-led consortium focused on advancing electronics manufacturing.

Prof BI Keyun of the Chinese Electronic Packaging Society, and Huang Jianzhong from the Ministry of Information Industry of China, acted as officiating guests for the official ribbon-cutting. They were joined by electronics industry leaders, government officials, and representatives from academia and industry associations.

Following the opening ceremony, leading experts discussed key industry issues during the "Innovation for the Electronics Industry" forum. Topics included environmental legislation in China and its implications, miniaturization and its future direction, and the quality and reliability of the global supply chain. These are also the major strategic areas for iNEMI collaboration in the coming years.

"China is an important and growing manufacturing hub in the global electronics industry, and we are making a concerted effort to increase our presence and consortial activities here in order to serve the needs of our members who are already running significant operations in this region, and also to help those fast-growing Chinese companies to become international players by providing well integrated global solutions" said Nasser Grayeli, iNEMI Chairman and Vice President, Technology & Manufacturing of Intel Corporation, who participated in the opening event.

"We hope our members in China will get involved - network with other iNEMI members, share best practices, provide input to the roadmap and more," said Jim McElroy, CEO of iNEMI. "iNEMI's success is, and always has been, dependent on the involvement and leadership of our members."

"We are pleased to celebrate the opening of iNEMI's Shanghai office and are encouraged by the level of participation we were able to generate in our opening ceremony and forum, both from our members and from other leading electronics organizations," said ZHU Jian, chair of the iNEMI China Steering Committee, president of SMTA China and director of PBA manufacturing for Alcatel Shanghai Bell. "We plan to use this momentum to develop a strong base of activity in the region. We are already defining and organizing regional deployment projects in Asia and expect to launch several during the first quarter of 2008."

A Steering Committee is facilitating and coordinating all iNEMI technical activities for the region. They have established three technical subcommittees, under which deployment activities will be organized. These are Manufacturing/Assembly Technologies, Component/Substrate Technologies and Materials Technologies. iNEMI's first regional deployment project is currently being formed. It is an initiative to address solder paste deposition issues.