Startup offers maskless litho for PCB production

LONDON — Maskless Lithography Inc. (San Jose, Calif.), a 2005 startup led by a group of electronics industry veterans, is offering a direct-write digital imaging technology for printed circuit board (PCB) production.

The MLI-2027 direct-write lithography system is the industry's first to combine high throughput and yield with unparalleled accuracy using standard "Non-LDI" resists, the company said.

Maskless also announced today that contract electronics manufacturer Sanmina-SCI Corp. has accepted delivery on the first production tool after completing beta testing, validation and qualification of the Maskless MLI-2027 equipment at their San Jose facility.

The company was founded by Dan Meisburger, who serves as CTO. He is joined on the executive team by CEO and president, William Elder, and COO, Edward Carignan.

Silicon Valley veteran Elder founded Genus Inc., a semiconductor capital equipment company, which he took public in 1988. Genus was acquired by Aixtron AG in 2005. Carignan is a 25-year veteran in the global PCB industry, holding senior roles with Sanmina-SCI where he had profit and loss responsibility for fabrication divisions in Malaysia, Singapore and China. He also led the division's overseas expansion strategy.

"In 2005, based upon our founding partners' experience in both lithography and metrology, we identified an opportunity to develop a lithography system that could deliver unrivalled value to the PCB market. We believe we have exceeded that initial vision and are now ready to share this tried and tested capability," said Meisburger, in a statement.

Meisburger has more than 20 years experience managing and developing lithography and metrology products. He has held senior roles at Ultratech Stepper, IBM, Hewlett-Packard and KLA-Tencor where he was responsible for developing the world's first high-speed electron beam wafer inspection tool.

"We are really impressed with Maskless' unique direct-write lithography tool," commented Mike Keri, vice president of operations for Sanmina-SCI, in the same statement. "The MLI-2027 has allowed us to meet highly challenging designs using conventional dry film resists at high yields and high throughput rates."

Related links and articles:

www.maskless.com

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