Alpha Shines at LED A.R.T. Symposium in Atlanta

Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

Alpha, the world leader in the production of electronic soldering and bonding materials, had a strong presence at the first annual LED Assembly, Reliability, Testing Symposium organized by SMTA that was recently held in Atlanta, Georgia.  Alpha was an integral part of the program as an organizer, exhibitor and presenter.

Dr. Robert Karlicek, LED industry luminary and Director of RPI’s Smart Lighting Engineering Research Center, presented a Keynote address titled “Emerging Trends in LED Packaging, Applications and Systems” in which he reviewed cutting edge trends in the LED industry.

In his keynote address, Kurt-Juergen Lang, LED Key Expert at Osram Opto Semiconductors presented “Reliability for LEDs and LED Lighting Systems,” where-in he covered the basics of LED reliability, assembly process impacts on reliability and reliability requirements for key end uses.  He also presented the results of a joint study between Osram Opto Semiconductors and Alpha, which studied the impact of solder alloy selection on LED assembly reliability. 

Amit Patel, Project Manager, Engineer – LED for Alpha, presented his paper, Characterization and Optimization of Board Warpage for Linear LED Lighting Assemblies.  His presentation focused on board warpage issues faced by manufacturers of LED T-8 tubes and ways of overcoming these issues.

Gyan Dutt, Technical Marketing Manager – LED for Alpha served on the Technical Committee for the LED A.R.T. Symposium and helped organize the event.  In addition, he presented LED Die Attach Selection: Trends and Considerations in which Gyan discussed the varied die attach requirements of multiple LED device structures and applications, and LED die attach material solutions for these needs.

The event included over 70 attendees, 16 exhibiting companies and a total of 18 technical presentations over the course of two days.  The material discussed had direct industry applications for the whole supply chain with unique emphasis on product realization with LEDs.

“The information provided during the LED A.R.T. Symposium helped to bridge the gap between LED device physics and the architectural design level issues in LED supply chain,” said Ravi Bhatkal, Vice President, Energy Technologies at Alpha.

“We were delighted to participate and share our findings and insights with the industry and believe this was a great forum to explore the reliability assessment and qualification of LED lighting products and potential solutions.”

The symposium concluded with a tour of Georgia Institute of Technology’s Packaging Research Center and the Institute for Electronics and Nanotechnology (IEN). 

Gyan Dutt - Biography

Gyan Dutt is Technical Marketing Manager – LED for Alpha.  He is responsible for planning, organization and implementation of the ALPHA® product portfolio for LED packaging, interconnect and assembly.  He has more than 12 years of experience in technical marketing, product development and applications engineering in semiconductor packaging in the US and Asia-Pacific region.  He co-chairs the iNEMI Solid State Illumination Technology Working Group for the 2015 roadmap cycle and is a member of the SMTA Technical Committee for the LED A.R.T. Symposium.  Gyan has an MS in Polymer Engineering from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville and an MBA from the University of California in Los Angeles, Anderson School of Management.

Amit Patel - Biography

Amit Patel is a Technology and Applications Analyst – LED for Alpha.  In his current role, he is instrumental in planning, coordinating and executing market research, and applications research for the design and implementation of electronic assembly materials for all levels of LED manufacturing, from LED die attach to module assembly.  Amit holds a Bachelors’ degree in Electrical Engineering from The New Jersey Institute of Technology. He is also an Alent trained Six Sigma Black Belt. To date, he has published 3 papers in the areas covering Assembly Processes, and Thermal Management for the solid state lighting industry.

About Alpha

Alpha, a business unit of Alent plc, is the global leader in the development, manufacturing and sales of innovative specialty materials used in a wide range of industry segments, including electronics assembly, power electronics, die attach, LED lighting, photovoltaics, semiconductor packaging, automotive and others.

With a unique global presence in over 30 locations throughout the Americas, Europe and Asia Pacific regions, Alpha supplies a full line of ALPHA® electronics assembly material products, including Solder Paste, Exactalloy® Solder Preforms, Cored Solder Wire Solder, Wave Soldering Fluxes, Bar Solder Alloys, and Stencils.  It offers die attach product technologies to the power electronics segment in its Argomax®, Atrox™, Maxrel™, and Fortibond™ brands. For the LED segment, Alpha offers its Lumet™ products covering applications from die attach to systems assembly in the LED manufacturing process.

Alpha also offers product technologies for the Photovoltaic segment, including its unique pre-fluxed ALPHA® PV Ready Ribbon®, high performance standard ribbon, bus bar, solder wire and flux. Alpha’s Advanced Materials unit is the leader in electronic polymers and solder materials for semiconductor packaging applications.  Since its founding in 1872, Alpha has been committed to developing and manufacturing the highest quality specialty materials.  For more information, visit www.alpha.alent.com.