Isola opens expanded R&D lab at new HQ

The company is nearly doubling the size and capacity of the testing facility, which enables enhanced product development, material qualification, application engineering, and technical support to printed circuit board fabricators and its OEM customers. The Arizona operations also include an 118’000-square-foot quick-turnaround manufacturing facility to accommodate the industry’s agile demands. In the R&D and analytical lab, the company’s lab team conducts electrical, thermal, and mechanical characterizations of resin components and PCB laminate materials used in the production of printed circuit boards. Known as the Johann Schumacher Laboratories, the facility is named for an Isola technical fellow and engineer. “The North American PCB market is all about quick turnaround and high complexity. Isola’s investment in local testing and analysis complements the investments our customers have made to meet the growing complexity of the products designed by OEMs,” says Travis Kelly, President and CEO, in a press release. “The expanded R&D and analytical services laboratory furthers our ability to both improve analytical capability and maintain quick turnaround times.” The lab includes a variety of testing equipment – from Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) Analysis for identification of contaminants to micro-section equipment used for evaluation of PCB integrity after thermal excursions. The thermal analysis area consists of 17 instruments that measure thermal properties as a function of temperature while specimens are subject to a controlled temperature program.