Interplex Junction - The Place to Connect

Interplex Industries is now an Amtek Engineering Company.

With the recent completion of Amtek's acquisition of Interplex, the combination of the businesses creates a truly global precision engineering company that offers some of the most comprehensive and integrated precision engineering solutions in the industry. With the enlarged geographic footprint and expanded product and services offering, we are even better positioned to serve our customers' evolving needs.

Traditionally, Interplex has provided small precision metal and plastic components, including proprietary press-fit interconnects and solder-bearing lead technology. Teamed with Amtek, we can now offer a complete metal and plastic solution -- the stamping, molding and assembly of both smaller precision components and larger precision assemblies, such as metal enclosures for racks and servers and printers.

Card-edge interconnects are critical for the success of a wide range of today's electronics assemblies, especially those involving mother-board to daughter-board or other PCB-to-PCB connection requirements.

Maximizing production efficiency typically requires that the mother-board be fully assembled and tested prior to integration of daughter-boards.  Also board assembly processes need to be optimized for high-automation, mixed-technology, SMT production, with secondary processes kept to a minimum.  Finally, it's important to not risk damage to components by reheating completed assemblies during secondary soldering steps.

The combination of SMT Card-edge connectors with solder-free compliant Press-Fit technology has moved to the forefront as the go-to solution for most PCB-to-PCB interconnect requirements.

Creating optimal interconnects within micro-electronic components, such as semiconductors, MEMS devices, sensors and other integrated modules, requires an approach that is rugged, reliable, keeps down production cost and minimizes complexity.  

Wire bonding has long been the leading methodology for making interconnects within modules. Driven by a widening range of application requirements, wire bonding is being used to seamlessly meet the needs for interconnects at a variety of levels, including within the module itself, between internal devices and also to the substrate. 

However, successful wire bonding is critically dependent on having proper surface finish on the the components and the substrates.  To meet today's application requirements, this necessitates processes that can incorporate a variety of electroplated finishes on to structural components as part of the custom stamping process.

Just as the PC/104 standard allows a wide range of choices for creating a variety of system-level configurations, designers of board-level solutions and sub-system modules also need to be aware of different choices about how best to implement the PC/104 connectors on their products.

One of the key opportunity areas for improving quality, cost and production efficiency is using either solderless or self-soldering interconnects - both for the PC/104 bus connectors and others, such as the I/O edge-mount connectors typically found on most PC/104 assemblies.

Soldering continues to be the most widely used method for attachment of components on printed circuit boards (PCBs) and also for implementing a diverse range of interconnects between PCBs (mother-boards, daughter-boards, modules, etc.).

The capabilities of catheters used in the medical industry have been steadily evolving over recent decades but we are now seeing a giant leap forward with the emerging trend of new-generation Smart-Catheters.

Smart-Catheters provide more than just a one-way conduit by incorporating two-way feedback and control mechanisms, such as sending and receiving signals between the proximal and distal ends, which enables applications to use the distal-end information to perform additional functions that are guided in real-time by the two-way feedback loops or the ability to provide energy at the distal tip for selected ablation.

Electronic modules, sensors and MEMs applications are proliferating throughout a variety of industries and are driving a need for new and better methods for creating interconnections - both internally within the modules and also to provide external connections from the modules. 

Many applications utilizing electronic systems need fully Integrated, modular, ‘plug & play’ package units with multiple internal connection platforms that support the combination of various technologies from chip-level up through mini-board and module level.

Even as feature-rich complexity of the module designs continues to increase, the associated interconnect complexity needs to be held to a minimum.

The optimal approach is to combine injection molding with fine precision stamping of metal interconnection platforms that are plated for a variety of application-specific wire bond requirements.

Let's face it.  Some things just naturally belong together.

Press-Fit/Compliant technology and insert molded plastic electronic modules are definitely one of those perfect matches that makes a lot of sense from the start and then just keeps getting better with time.

Compliant/Press-Fit technology has already been established as a proven standard in automotive electronics, power modules and other areas, which enables solder-free interconnects with high reliability and cost-saving process simplification. The ability to eliminate soldering hassles along with delivering excellent thermal characteristics and high-current carrying capacity has made press-fit a preferred solution in these arenas.

These advantages are now also driving the adoption of press-fit technology in a widening array of applications, including wearable tech products, medical monitoring devices, and industrial systems.  In response, suppliers are expanding the configurations and size ranges of available press-fit interconnects to meet this expanding range of needs.  

Today's press-fit offerings go well beyond the standard sizes, such as .64mm and .80mm, which have become ubiquitous in automotive and power applications. New Micro, Mini and Macro version are addressing the needs of markets like wearable electronics, medical monitoring devices and high-current industrial busbars. 

This year's SENSOR+TEST exhibition will be held in Nürnberg, Germany from 3‐5 June 2014.      

As always, we're looking forward to seeing the newest advances as well as showing the latest technologies from Interplex.  The chance to interact and share ideas with other leaders in the sensor marketplace and to understand the real-world challenges facing hands-on engineers is invaluable to us.