Editor, First, I'll introduce myself. I'm Bruce Gehman of SEMI in San Jose. After Murray Bullis retired in January, I became head of the SEMI International Standards Department. You might imagine that I'm corresponding to rebut the negative-sounding comments about SEMI in your column (Assembly Lines) in the March 2001 issue. Sometime we might indeed chat about this, but that is not my purpose now. In your column you did speak about the SEMI standards program in terms that I interpret as being supportive. We appreciate this, and that is what motivates my contacting you. One of the biggest problems in the SEMI standards program is revitalizing the assembly and packaging committees in the U.S. and Europe. There is really, at bottom, only one problem: the identification of meaningful issues around which consensus "best practice" can be developed, and which have sufficient economic or technical impact to justify standards development activity. The backend seems to be so fragmented that there is little in the way of a clear path. I'm an old (maybe "former" would be a more congenial term) packaging person myself, and I persist in the belief that SEMI standards can play a useful role in this area. I'm also convinced that if we are aggressive and resourceful, good standardization projects will start to materialize. (I read Chip Scale Review with the idea of staying informed and in the hope of identifying key industry issues.) Dr. Bruce L. Gehman Senior Director, International Standards, SEMI Indeed, Chip Scale Review does support all meaningful standards programs. We will gladly assist Dr. Gehman in "revitalizing" the assembly and packaging committees. If you'd like to help, too, contact him at bgehman@semi.org-Editor |
Copyright © 2001