ROSEMONT, IL — Industry-leading associations IPC and SMTA announce the jointly sponsored High-Performance Electronics Cleaning Symposium to be held at the Crowne Plaza Chicago O’Hare in Rosemont, IL on October 28-29, 2008.

Jim Raby, renowned 50-year industry veteran, will begin the cleaning symposium as the featured keynote speaker for Day 1. Jim brings a real-world perspective to the challenges of the past and future. The conference is designed to be user-driven and attendees will learn from experienced colleagues who are deeply involved with manufacturing residues, fluxes, and cleaning needs.

Electronics assembly continues to meet the demands for increased performance driven by the forces for smaller, faster, and cheaper innovative designs. The experience and learning curves from automated assembly equipment, semiconductor, component, materials, and packaging innovations allow for greater functionality at lower costs. Cleaning assemblies after the soldering process, in light of no-clean flux innovations, was only needed for the high-reliability products. Increased complexity and disruptive influences of miniaturization, high I/O counts, and lead-free soldering creates the need for engineers to reconsider reliability standards and the benefits of cleaning. The cleaning symposium will provide important information about cleaning in today’s high-performance electronics industry.