Retronix 'IC Rescue' process helps maximise returns for a service repair company.

A service company that specialised in field repairs of telecommunication systems had a large quantity of spare PCBs, all brand new, that they bought in order to carry out repairs on systems. The product turned out to be far more reliable than estimated, and the product did not sell in the volumes expected.

The end result was that the service company ended up with a large quantity of brand new PCBs they had no use for, and there was no obvious external market.

Using Retronix’s “IC Rescue” process, the PCBs were stripped of valuable ICs, which were then offered to the market as 100% genuine, zero hours use ICs which were safely recovered from brand new PCBs.

These were either utilised on other PCBs which used the same chips, or sold on the general market to other companies, who knew they were recovered but also knew it was done with zero reflows and were from brand a new certified product.

This allowed the service company to maximise their return  on this product which otherwise would have returned no value, other than precious metal recovery.

For more information -

Know more about Retronix | CLICK HERE |

Know more about our IC Rescue Process | CLICK HERE |

We welcome you to join our LinkedIn group | CLICK HERE |

Contact us : | CLICK HERE | info@retronix.com | sales@retronix.com

YouTube | LinkedIn | Twitter

Anti Counterfeit IC Testing : Visual Inspection

As part of the Retronix Anti-Counterfeit IC testing service a customer approached us asking for our level 1 authenticity test, specifically the visual inspection service.

The customer send us approximately 3000 qty - NUD4700 type parts and asked to pick a random sample of 11 for visual inspection to check for authenticity. The reel information and datecodes given were the following: 

    Where :

  

    M = Date Code

    MNH = Device Code

    . = Pb-Free Package

The first check straight away points out certain discrepancies.  Markings do not match the information on the datasheet, and the direction of the text with reference to the Anode was found to be incorrect, further inspection about the device itself revealed the following:

As it can be seen from the datasheet image and from the image that is sourced from Mouser Electronics, the bottom side of the device should be connected to the Cathode and continue onto the entire bottom side. But as can be seen with the image of the device on the right that these devices have two isolated pins with the bottom side being the outer casing and not a contact, this shows us that the device in question is not as per standard and is considered suspect.

Continuing investigation of the device for further inspection shows:

1                                              2        

Device contacts are found to be incorrect, Anode and Cathode are formed into a gull wing as can be seen in 'Image 2' and not as they originally should have been as shown in 'Image 1'

Conclusion :

The visual inspection of the sample puts the batch as suspect and cannot be termed original as per standard datasheet and information available about the device. The report along with all photographic evidence and technical information was provided as a report to the customer as suspect counterfeit. This gives the customer a good insight into future purchases from the buyer and also this current purchase which could have caused big issues in case the customer would have gone on and implemented the same into his supply chain.

Are you interested in getting your IC purchases tested and have complete peace of mind? We have a huge range of IC testing services which can be found  here : Tell me more

In case you need to know more about our services and want to get in touch with our test manager then send in your enquiry using our contact us page : Click Here

For more info about Retronix - Click Here

We welcome you to join our LinkedIn group Click Here

Contact us : Click Here | info@retronix.com | sales@retronix.com

YouTube | LinkedIn | Twitter

Mr.Tony Boswell at SMT Nuremberg 2013, talking about the new processes at Retronix Ltd.

Tony talks about the electronic component recovery business, and that Retronix have developed a process that avoid any additional reflow cycles, Tony also goes on to explain that it is not just economic factors but supply chain shortages that have led to a growing demand for IC Recovery.

Source: EMS Now

In order to know more please visit our website on www.retronix.com or you can contact us directly from the website using our contact us section http://retronix.com/contact-us or you can also email us on info@retronix.com 

For relevant updates please do follow us on our various social media channels:

Twitter : https://twitter.com/RetronixUK
LinkedIn : | Click Here |
LinkedIn Group : | Click Here |
YouTube: | Click Here |
Facebook: | Click Here |

Retronix- A One Stop Shop For All IC Testing and IC Repair

Retronix IC test facility is not only a one stop shop for all IC testing, we can carry out in house repair too.  From various electrical tests to detect counterfeit, to solderability and programming testing, we are equipped to test most ICs.  However with our alloy conversion & retinning services, we can repair any repairable faults.  If old ICs (QFP or BGA) have solderability issues, we can repair and verify the fix.  We can also convert from lead to lead free and vice versa.

For more info about Retronix | CLICK HERE |

We welcome you to join our LinkedIn group | CLICK HERE |

Contact us : | CLICK HERE | info@retronix.com | sales@retronix.com

YouTube | LinkedIn | Twitter

Retronix's Process Reduces OEM Production Costs for NPI by Over 50%

A division of a large telecoms company was responsible for the design of new products, specifically telecoms switches. These pcbs cost $15k each to make. This company would make perhaps 5 different versions, each one an improved version of the first, until they were satisfied with the design and released it to production.

Although each new version of the pcb is slightly different, most of the ICs, which make up 90% of the cost, are the same.

By sending the previous version of the pcb to Retronix for component recovery, the oem reduced the cost of their NPI production process by over 50%, without compromising quality, using Retronix’s IC rescue process.

Retronix @ Electronica 2012 | Munich, Germany - Part II

The second half of Electronica became very busy as there were many visitors at the booth wanting to know about Retronix, specially services like BGA reballing, IC Recovery, Anti-Counterfeit IC Testing and Alloy Conversion which were of special interest.

The BGA Reballing video and the IC Rescue video were grabbing visitors attention and every visitor was interested in our processes which does not involve any reflows! This process is exclusively offered by Retronix and it gives the ability to recover, reball, rework without any reflows. Most of the visitors at the stand were majorly concentrated from Asia viz. China, India interested in either IC Tests or Recovery. The second half of the day there was maximum footfall keeping the booth extremely busy at all times and each representative from Retronix were occupied in talking to customers | opportunities in explaining all the various aspects about Retronix.

Word start to spread even representatives from big companies started to pop by our booth to know more about this unique process and how it could mutually benefit and bring costs down creating synergy for both corporate entities. As was planned during the whole event in the evening from 4pm onwards the whisky tasting event was organised. The second half of electronica with reference to the whisky tasting event was very popular as word had spread over the first two days about the event and therefore many more visitors dropped by at the booth for the whisky tasting event, Retronix did not mind it as the company had well anticipated the big footfall and more the visitors the better it was for the company to explain its services and discuss business over some fine Scotch. The event again was declared a resounding success as many discussions turned into real opportunities and subsequently in the future a continuing business relationship.

For Retronix, Electronica 2012 has been productive in terms of brand enhancement and also business development and this concludes the story of Electronica for 2012.

To know more about Retronix please click here

To know more about the unique processes click here

To contact us for any enquiries please click here | or email us at 

info@retronix.com

The Retronix advantage: Recovering and reusing ICs from scrap or obsolete PCBs

A CEM had a large customer base of complex telecoms PCBs, and found these difficult to debug if they failed after assembly. This was mainly due to their being such a large amount of revisions, the techs found it difficult to be familiar with all of them.

Subsequently there was a lot of PCB “shotgunning” going on. This was the practice of making an educated guess at what IC was causing the issue, and changing it. This meant a huge expense in ICs, most of which were thought to be fine; it would be a solder problem causing the fault (open or short under the BGA).

So they introduced an exercise of sending the removed ICs to Retronix for IC Recovery, and putting them then back into the repair loop. For IC Recovery were also sent 3^rd time failed PCBs.

This resulted in a 61% drop in IC cost in the repair area, with no noticeable difference in test yields.

All the ICs were tested electrically by Retronix before being returned.

If you want to learn more, please contact us here

Watch the video about IC Recovery here

Retronix working with Service Repair Companies

A cell phone company manufactured its product in Asia, but had an EU Service based operation for EMEA. The service operation had small easy fix/replacement centres scattered around EMEA, but central repair facilities for PCB debug and repair issues.

It bought parts in bulk from HQ, but experienced many issues with parts shortages, over stocking and obsolete stock at the end of life for a product.

Retronix introduced a programme whereby they recovered the scrap PCBs from the company’s CEM manufacturing operations in Asia, (which were previously landfilled) and recovered the ICs locally. The recovered ICs were then shipped to the EU and held by Retronix free of charge. The service company had online access to all parts held, effectively parts held which had cost nothing, and were known genuine.

The service company would then call off parts as needed by its repair operations. At this point the parts would be refurbished using Retronix’s “IC Rescue” safe process and shipped in a few days to where they were needed. At this point Retronix would invoice for the refurbishment, which was a fraction of the cost of buying new.

The service company experienced no issues with these parts, which were brand new with zero hours use, and had been recovered using the safe “IC Rescue” process.

This successful programme slashed the parts costs of the service company, in terms of both buying and sourcing, as well as reducing obsolete costs massively.

If you want to learn more, please contact us here

A possible solution to “Hard to find electronic components”, when you cannot find the new parts, on time

A USA based OEM was looking for Xilinx parts but they could not be found within the timescale. It was offered parts by a broker in China which were advertised as “refurbished”. After further investigation, the OEM found out the parts were on scrap PCBs which the broker had bought from a local CEM. However the part were still on the PCBs, and the PCBs were in ESD bags, in boxes.

The broker was planning on outsourcing the recovery and refurbishment of the BGAs to a local company in Shenzhen, however Retronix was asked by the OEM to do the BGA recovery.

IC Recovery/ IC Repair

We recovered the Xilinx parts and others from the PCBs locally in Shenzhen. This was done using our new “IC Rescue” process that recovers ICs without a reflow cycle in order to comply with the IC manufacturers’ specifications.  The parts were packed and shipped to our European facility. Shipping of the ICs only was low cost. The remainders of the PCBs were sent for recycling in Shenzhen.

BGA Reballing

Retronix then removed the excess solder from the BGAs, using a controlled process without reflow or abrasion, then cleaned the parts and immediately reballed them. The parts were mechanically & electrically inspected and packed to be shipped to the USA based OEM.

The parts were placed without any issue and zero failures were reported.

Certificate verification

The remainder of the parts were held by Retronix pending sale by the broker, and were sold with a “Retronix Certified” certificate of conformance, protecting the broker and the end user.

If you want to learn more, please contact us here

IC Recovery: Retronix “IC Rescue” process in action

With the demise of Nortel, it has left existing users with a problem if they want to expand their existing Nortel telecoms telephone system – where do they get the hardware?

Flextronics were tasked with supplying a daughter board for an exchange, and could source all the parts apart from one – the Nortel processor itself.

The part was a NT6X54AA ASIC, long since out of production. The only alternative at the time was to set up a production run to make a batch of chips – however this was a massive cost.

Then it was discovered that although the revision of daughter board needed did not exist, earlier revisions of the board existed in quite large numbers – and the only constant between all the revisions was the ASIC chip!

So Retronix was asked to carry out a recovery operation on the chips so they could be re-used.

Retronix used their unique IC Rescue process to remove and refurbish the ASIC chips without using any dangerous heat or abrasive processes. All chips were then fully tested, both mechanically and electrically, and supplied to the CEM to be installed on the latest revision of PCB.

This proved a highly successful operation, with no reported field failures after 2 years of installation.

For further info on how Retronix can help you recover chips for reuse, to either save money, the environment or because you cant source them, email us at info@retronix.com

Safe Recovery White Paper: Learn more about Retronix Zero Reflow Cycles Process for IC Rescue by clicking here.