Fraunhofer IZM – one of the world’s leading institutes in system integration and product-oriented microelectronic and microsystem technology packaging – is entering a new era. Professor Herbert Reichl, one of the institute’s founding fathers, has retired. Management of the institute will fall into the trusted hands of Dr. Klaus-Dieter Lang.

Groundbreaking development
Herbert Reichl transformed Berlin into a leading center for the integration of electronics into everyday products during his career as Professor for Packaging at the Technische Universität Berlin and Director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Reliability and Microintegration IZM. From anti-collision radars to chip cards and pace makers – Herbert Reichl has turned countless promising applications into cutting-edge products by integrating electronics. Over 500 patents were filed during his time as Director of Fraunhofer IZM. Thanks to his commitment, sophisticated flip-chip technologies were licensed and released internationally as early as in the 1990s. Today, this technology is firmly established globally. The first reliability models for complex chip assemblies were developed under his leadership. With the development of embedding, Prof. Reichl and his colleagues revolutionized PCBs. The world’s smallest pump, fuel cell, CMOS camera, hearing aid and autarkic sensor node were all developed during his time at Fraunhofer IZM.
The influence of his work has extended far beyond Germany and Europe. His prestigious national and international awards, including the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany and the highest honor of the US IEEE, illustrate the esteem in which he and his team are held thanks to their indefatigable quest for progress in field*.

What’s next?
Because the challenges ahead are great, his successors will now develop system integration and electronic packaging in two highly promising directions. Application-oriented and manufacturable solutions have to be developed more quickly than before in joint projects with industry. This changes the institute’s approach. If before everything revolved around technology, which gave the impetus for new developments, and the application was the final destination, today the application determines what the technology has to look like.

In Berlin, the relevancy of development to specific systems and applications will be emphasized even further under Acting Director Dr.-Ing. Dr. sc. techn. Klaus-Dieter Lang. According to Dr. Lang, “[Fraunhofer IZM] will continue to advance reliability, the integration of sensors and actuators, miniaturization and adaptation to defined build spaces, however, [the institute’s] research will always be firmly geared towards application and aimed at producing prototypes suitable for industry.”

Dr. Lang, who holds a PhD in Electrotechnology and is an internationally renowned expert on miniaturization technologies and system integration in microsystem technology, has for example established a new, already operational line for multifunctional boards. The continuous processing line is designed for direct transfer into industrial manufacturing. Finally, the new project group All Silicon System Integration Dresden (ASSID) rounds off the institute’s R&D for 3D silicon system integration by including wafer-level development.

The focus in Munich, under Acting Director Prof. Dr.-Ing. Karlheinz Bock, will be on so-called multifunctional on-top technologies (MOTT) and on board-level polytronics. To ensure the highest possible flexibility, the Fraunhofer Gesellschaft has decided to continue the research topics in Munich within an independent institute.

The Fraunhofer Institute for Modular Solid State Technology (EMFT) in Munich will officially open on July 1st, 2010 and will merge polytronic and biosystem integration research with research on silicon and MEMS technologies. This move is expected to produce significant research and development synergies and advance multifunctional system development.

Events
Fraunhofer IZM’s Packaging Day on July 6th 2010 will present future trends and challenges in the industry. The institute is also taking the opportunity to bid a hearty farewell to Prof. Herbert Reichl.

Fraunhofer EMFT held a press conference in Munich on July 28th 2010 to publicize their future areas of interest.

*Herbert Reichl’s career has been impressive. After studying electrical engineering, he completed his PhD at the Institute for Integrated Circuits at the TU Munich. In 1987 he accepted an appointment as Professor at the TU Berlin, where he was additionally appointed as Director of the Forschungsschwerpunkt “Technologien der Mikroperipherik”. He is also co-founder and, since 1993, Director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Reliability and Microintegration in Berlin.

Scientific excellence
Prof. Reichl is author of more than 900 scientific papers and books, and a member of numerous national and international committees and scientific advisory boards. He heads the research group Heterogeneous Integration within the European technology platform Nanoelectronics, is a member of the advisory board of the Eureka Initiative’s MEDEA+ and the advisory councils of the Eureka Initiative’s Euripides, the Ferdinand-Braun-Institut für Höchstfrequenztechnik and the Fraunhofer Institute for Computer Architecture and Software Technology. Additionally, he acts as scientific consultant to Silicon Sensor GmbH and KSG Leiterplatten GmbH. Prof. Reichl supervised 6 academic appointments and 85 PhD dissertations over his teaching career.

Awards
In 2000 Prof. Reichl received the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany, an honorary doctorate from the Universität Chemnitz and was named IEEE Fellow for his extraordinary accomplishments. The Fraunhofer Gesellschaft also recognized his outstanding contribution to research and development by awarding him the Fraunhofer Medal. He has also received numerous awards from international organizations such as the IEEE and iNEMI. He was awarded the VDE Golden Ring in 2006 and the IEEE’s 2010 “Components, Packaging & Manufacturing Technology” Award.