FPC technology – a growing opportunity

Theo Langer, VP Sales Asia and Global Sales Coordinator, explains: “The FPC market is a PCB technology segment that is growing over proportionally compared to rigid boards and/or other PCB technologies. The global FPC market is expected to roughly grow by 50% from 2011 to 2015 – about 9% annually.” According to Mr. Langer, European and US FPC producers only hold a small portion of the global production volume, approximately 2% and 9%. “To fill the gap between local production and actual demand is exactly where the fabless PCB provider CML EurAsia comes into play,” Mr Langer adds. Nearly 50% of FPC boards produced are single sided boards, about 35% are double-sided boards, and the rest is almost equally distributed between flex multilayer and rigid-flex boards. Given the important advantage that flex technology supports hardware design optimization, CML sees a lot of upward potential in this technology segment in the western world in the years to come. “Before this backdrop, CML decided to invest time and resources to provide customers with a technical facts and figures guide to support the decision making process when it comes to selecting and designing the right flex technology for individual projects,” says Theo Langer.