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John Perry: From Mailing IPC Standards to Guiding Them
December 29, 2025 | Barry Matties, Community MagazineEstimated reading time: 2 minutes
John Perry's journey with the Global Electronics Association (formerly IPC) started when he was 8 years old, inspired by his mother's role in organizing IPC company meetings. Driven by his passion for aviation and standards, he went on to a career in computer science and IT. Today, he is the director of Printed Boards Standards & Technology for the Association, collaborating with industry leaders, including those at Lockheed Martin.
Barry Matties: John, you have a long history with the Global Electronics Association, thanks to your mother. Tell me how you got started.
John Perry: Yes, she (Virginia Bergman) was the manager of the Meetings Department. This was in the early 1980s, when we had two semiannual meetings in the spring and fall. There was no IPC APEX EXPO back then. She would scout and book the location, and put together the schedule for the entire event, including all the committee meetings for standards, the tech paper sessions, and any workshops. I'd come home from school, and the dining room table would just be laid out with all kinds of papers. She would also do the layout for the schedule onsite, which we on staff affectionately called the “Pocket Weasel,” because people could shove the schedule in their pockets. But there was no word processor for her to work on, no Microsoft Office. She was making corrections with Xacto blades and those little white strips. I think it was Avery’s white strips. The papers would be strewn out for weeks, and then she'd compile them all and bring them to the printers, and that was how she put together the onsite guide.
You were literally raised right in the mix?
Yeah. I would come home from school, look at that stuff on the table, and think, “What is that?” It was printed circuit board design and flex circuits, but it was a mystery to me. But it was intriguing, and I would think, “Someday, I might want to know what the heck that means.”
Continue reading this article in the Fall 2025 issue of Community Magazine.
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