Custom Interconnect Ltd Shortlisted in The Electronics Industry Awards in Three Categories

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Well done to the team at Custom Interconnect Ltd for being short listed for the two business awards “Electronics Manufacturer of the Year” and “Excellence in Innovation” and Symon Franklin for Industry personality award for his work with IPC Standards, at this year’s national The Electronics Industry Awards.

Electronics Manufacturer of the Year award shortlist is due to CIL's overall manufacturing effort over the last 12 months. As well as supporting our on-going CEM/EMS customers, our Net Zero DER / APC / InnovateUK projects, CIL opened in June 2023 the UK’s largest Semiconductor packaging facility. A combination of a growing customer base, diverse “Net Zero” projects such as Automotive SiC BEV, EV Charging, Drone eVTOL charging, web hub GaN PSU’s, 5G RF packaging, Aerospace and power generation projects are all finishing their R&D phase are now going into production.

Excellence in Innovation award shortlist is for CIL's work on future BEV systems with BMW and other project partners on APC15@FutureBEV and GaNSiC. CIL currently finds itself at the very forefront of the use of Silicon Carbide (SiC) and Gallium Nitride (GaN) on future energy efficient systems that include Automotive, Power Generation, Aviation and Space.

So, CIL is now innovating new technology in 3 distinct market sectors

• CEM/EMS provider of low – medium volume very complex PCBA
• Semiconductor packaging – die bonding, wire bonding and encapsulation
• SiC & GaN power module/discrete device/Power PCBA development and low – medium volume production

Industry personality award shortlist Symon Franklin for showning great diversity contributing to over 50 IPC standards and training committees including chairing the Committee for one of the flagship standards, IPC-A-610, helping to enhance the industry as a whole by brining consensus through standardisation. He has also continued to help promote training and continuous improvement throughout Custom Interconnect Ltd in his role as a trainer and production engineer and as an advocate for standardisation across a number of areas including space and military hardware, telecommunications, medical and automotive products.

Starting in late 2019, CIL was approached by BMW to join its APC15@FutureBEV consortium to develop BMW’s next generation of SiC Power modules and associated power PCBA for their future BEV systems. The APC15@FutureBEV project and publicity generated from it resulted in CIL finding itself now working on a total of 9 InnovateUK/APC/DER zero carbon projects which total £65M and CIL’s total project values are £8M. The 9 projects are in diverse low emission markets such as

• Automotive BEV (3 projects)
• BEV charging
• eVTOL vehicle systems and charging
• 5G RF MMIC packaging
• GaN PSU systems for web server hubs
• GaN PSU systems for very high efficiency power switching
• UK supply chain for high power PCB’s and AMB substrates

The success of the APC15@FutureBEV project and CIL’s association with BMW and other project partners has transformed CIL’s offering. With a total of 9 InnovateUK / DER / APC / DCMS projects now running simultaneously and further multiple projects from customers have approached CIL directly, CIL has now created the largest Semiconductor packaging and power device assembly facility in the UK. The 9 InnovateUK projects with more planned will enable to CIL to become the number 1 Power Electronics facility in the UK. Furthermore, CIL are working with 3 Catapults and the Universities of Warwick, Cardiff, Swansea, Bristol, Nottingham, Newcastle, Imperial College London and University College London. All of this has been achieved from a standing start on the InnovateUK projects 36 months ago. All of the above has necessitated CIL making the decision 18 months ago to commit to increasing its Andover UK manufacturing from 36,000sq ft to 100,000sq ft. The new BP2 facility came on-line in Q2 2023, the 64,000sq ft facility houses a 15,000sq ft of Class ISO7 (Class 10,000) cleanrooms for product development and subsequent full production of both micro-electronics and SiC and GaN based low carbon power electronics for multiple market sectors and a volume PCBA assembly area. It is now the UK’s largest Semiconductor packaging facility. In additional to the equipment installed to support existing business and the development projects, CIL has further investment plans for volume UK production. One product in manufacture at the new facility, requires 1,100,000 SMT placements per week and 1,200,000 wire bonds per week. There are 4 product lines planned in the new facility with annual volumes of 300K and 2.5M/annum respectively. These are not products being re-shored, they are new products where almost fully automatic assembly ensures CIL and the UK can compete. Historically they would have been lost offshore due to price and lack of UK capability. But the use of InnovateUK monies and CIL investment has meant we have created the semiconductor assembly facility the UK needs. As well as existing volumes, we are now having to re-learn how to manufacture volume products in the UK once more. Our customers are predominantly UK based, but 97% of all products we manufacture for all of them are exported globally. With the opening of the BP2 facility, CIL are now seeing export opportunities to countries such as Sweden, Holland, Belgium and the US.