The Next Phase of Innovation: Heterogeneous Integration

June 18, 2018

This is a post by the IEEE Electronics Packaging Society (EPS). To learn more about EPS, click here.

We are entering the era of digital economy and myriad connectivity. Look around you: the migration of data to the cloud, presence of smart devices everywhere and the emergence of autonomous vehicles are all great examples.

Recently, artificial intelligence and big data analytics have been undergirding the technical advances in every market. At this inflexion point, though, with the plateauing of economic advantage of semiconductor scaling and the explosive expansion of electronic products into global society, continued technological progress will require a new phase of electronics innovations.

Heterogeneous integration is rapidly becoming the key technology for the next decade, and will initiate a new era of technological and scientific advances. Heterogeneous integration refers to the integration of separately-manufactured components into a higher-level assembly that, in total, provides enhanced functionality and improved operating characteristics.

Packaging, for both systems and devices, will be the vanguard to this enormous advance. As a result, heterogeneous integration has become the highest strategic initiative of the IEEE Electronics Packaging Society (EPS).

EPS is the leading international forum for scientists and engineers engaged in the research, design, development and implementation of revolutionary advances in microsystems packaging and manufacturing.

The Society promotes close cooperation, collaboration and exchange of technical information through its conferences and peer-reviewed publications among researchers and practitioners of electrical and electronics engineering, mechanical engineering, physics, chemistry, materials science, systems and the allied arts and sciences.

The mission of this Heterogeneous Integration Roadmap is to provide guidance to the profession, industry, academia and government on key technical challenges with sufficient lead time to prevent them from becoming roadblocks to continued progress in electronics. That progress is essential to the future growth of the industry, and to the realization of technology’s promise of continued positive impact on mankind.