Jan Pedersen: Dieter Bergman IPC Fellowship Award Recipient

Estimated reading time: 6 minutes

From the IPC website: The Dieter Bergman IPC Fellowship Award is given to individuals who have fostered a collaborative spirit, made significant contributions to standards development, and have consistently demonstrated a commitment to global standardization efforts and the electronics industry. Each recipient will be eligible to bestow the Dieter Bergman Memorial Scholarship upon the university or college of his/her choice.

To view a video of Jan Pedersen receiving news about receiving this award, click here.

Patty Goldman speaks with Jan Pedersen of Elmatica, Dieter Bergman IPC Fellowship Award recipient, and Guro Krossen, Elmatica's communication manager, about Jan's extensive involvement with IPC on many committees developing standards, especially the automotive and medical addendums to IPC-6012 and 6013.

Patty Goldman: Jan, congratulations on this award; it’s a big deal as you know and a great accomplishment. How did you feel when you got that phone call?

Jan Pedersen: That was amazing. John Mitchell called me, he wanted a five to 10 minutes call and I thought, “What did he call me about?” He told me about this. I said, “Wow! It’s not possible. Who recommended me?” That was really a surprise, but I’m honored and really flattered that they wanted to recognize me.

Goldman: Tell us a little bit about yourself and your involvement with IPC.

Pedersen: If I tell something about myself it would be starting as a very young boy because my father had a PCB factory. I started as a child worker (laughs). I normally joke about that. When I came into my 20s, we bought another factory, and I was leading that factory as a production manager. Then I came to Elmatica in ‘92, and from here I’ve been more or less handling technologies, suppliers, and today I’m senior technical advisor. On the way, I was engaged into IPC, I think it was 2014. Then it was Lars Wallin who asked me to come to Germany and join a meeting where we were discussing starting an automotive addendum to the IPC-6012. It was just like when you show up as a parent to your child playing football or whatever, and you’re the only one that comes and you take all the jobs.

Nobody wanted to be the chairman. I said, “Okay, I can do that.” So that was the start, actually, when we began working with IPC, and of course it was the automotive addendum the first couple of years. Then I got this idea about the medical. I asked IPC if they were interested in creating a medical addendum to IPC-6012 and IPC-6013, and that is now going to be completed. We did 6012 last autumn and the 6013 addendum is in the works because IPC-6013E is going through ballot now and we need to wait for that. But during that period, I’ve been involved in a lot of committees and task groups for press fit and quite a lot for automotive, also.

Goldman: Are all your committees related to automotive or medical?

Pedersen: Yes, mostly automotive and medical related, but others as well. There have been a lot of committees, and one of them—I call it my baby—is to connect and have a better overview of the IPC-6010 series, or what is called D-33a, which is about the performance of the PCBs: IPC-6012, IPC-6013, IPC-6018, and all the addendums. My idea is we are creating addendums, but how does that correlate with the mother document? We are implementing requirements, tolerances, and so on into the addendums that probably should have been in the main document for them, and right now we are discussing ultra HDI PCBs. That’s an interest-group across quite a few of the committees, involving design, and performance, and it’s being led by myself and Herb Snowgren. We are discussing PCBs with the tracks and gaps down to 10 microns.

Goldman: That’s pretty small.

Pedersen: It is, yes. The technology’s out there.

Goldman: Okay, so back to your regular job; how do you fit it all in?

Pedersen: Evening time (laughs). It’s a full day job, or more than full day. Guro is listening here. She is always asking me to go into LinkedIn and write some articles and so on. That’s nighttime as well. So, there’s a lot of evening time.

Guro Krossen: He is doing a very good job. He’s always on. I think it’s like a 24/7 job for him; even if I’m sitting up late until 1:30 and thinking nobody else is there. He’s always very dedicated.

Goldman: So, when you say it’s your baby, it’s really your baby—you feel like a 24/7 parent.

Pedersen: It is. I’m quite passionate about getting the standards right and also getting them up to date. Like if you saw some of the guys in IPC were writing just two years ago that in the U.S. you had very few designs below 3-mil track and gap. Today, we are working with 1 mil. I get calls from California, from South Africa, people talking about, “Hey, we really need that 1-mil or a 25-micron track and gap boards.”

Goldman: What would you say to some young engineers and people getting into IPC? What is your advice to them?

Pedersen: My advice would be to engage with other people across the world, and make sure that you are connected. For me, a very good way to be connected was to join IPC. You get a lot of connections with people thinking not necessarily the same as yourself, but they’re working with the same topics. If you’re into electronics with manufacturing design, PCB manufacturing, assembly, or test, there are lots of people connected to IPC that are willing to share with you and discuss. I think that’s the best way to be on top of what’s going on.

Goldman: Yes. Now, one of the things with the Dieter Bergman Fellowship Award is a scholarship to the university or other school of your choice. Have you made a choice yet?

Pedersen: Yes, I have chosen two students working on a medical project at the University of South Eastern Norway. There are three reasons for choosing this project: it is medical, it needs miniaturization, and I have a close relationship to the electronics industry in this area, the “electronic coast.” We use the university’s premises when we meet, discussing PCBs in harsh environments and IPC standards.

The project is called “Arm neuroprosthesis equipped with artificial skin and sensorial feedback” (ARMIN), and the two students are Saad Rabbani and Samarbir Singh. Funny enough, none of them are Norwegians. One of them is from Pakistan and the other from India, and their hometowns are on the opposite sides of Kashmir—but the conflict has not stopped the friendship between these two students!

Saad and Samarbir are both masters in micro- and nano-systems technology, working on their master's theses related to the ARMIN project. Both are working on research that is very central to this project.

Since we are giving the scholarship to two students, Elmatica has decided to double it to $2,000 USD. Inspired by IPC, we plan to take this opportunity and make the scholarship into a yearly Elmatica event.

Goldman: That’s great to hear. Thanks Jan, and congratulations again.

RELATED VIDEO: