Company Profile – IPL, Dorchester, UK

Citation

(2002), "Company Profile – IPL, Dorchester, UK", Microelectronics International, Vol. 19 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/mi.2002.21819baf.001

Company Profile – IPL, Dorchester, UK

Company Profile – IPL, Dorchester, UK

Keyword: IPL

Winding my way through the picturesque countryside of southern Dorset, you would be forgiven for thinking that you were a million miles away from leading edge technology, yet this area is home to some of Britain's most innovative and successful companies.

One such company is Integrated Photomatrix Limited (IPL) in the county town of Dorchester in the south west of England. Founded in 1969 by six entrepreneurial engineers from that university of the microelectronics industry, the former Plessey Company at Caswell and Towcester. The original technical director Peter Fry lived in the locality, which was as good a reason as any to locate this new, embryonic company in this beautiful corner of southern England.

Background

IPL was originally formed as a manufacturer of sensors for camera systems, establishing it's own silicon processing line. Since then the company has grown and diversified by technology, acquisition and merger. The company is now a subsidiary of B. Elliott, a small conglomerate of companies manufacturing precision machine tools, electrical and electronics components and equipment. In 1998 IPL acquired the Hy-Comp product group, which added expertise in interconnection and packaging. Today, IPL comprises two distinct product groups; one manufactures a wide range of optoelectronic and ultra-sonic sensors and systems for applications as diverse as sensor gauges employed in heavy metal engineering to ultra-sensitive air-flow monitors for military use and high reliability blood monitors for medical applications. The other manufactures heavy metal gauges for engineering applications. Both divisions were moved to a superb new facility in nearby Poundbury in February 1999, which was opened by H.R.H. Prince Charles. The Poundbury Estate is owned by the Duchy of Cornwall and was established to provide affordable housing within walking distance of modern industrial units, sympathetically designed into the local environment.

Management

Today, IPL has 100 employees and has a group turnover approaching £10M. The management team has recently undergone a strengthening program with the appointment of a new managing Director, Graham Rothon. Having spent a number of years in Scandinavia heading up Nokia's non-US semiconductor division operations, Graham brings with him experience in the industry and a firm hand to guide the company.

The board working with Graham to drive the company forward are:

David Bishton - Sensors Sales Director;Adrian Jacobs - Systems Sales Director;Chris Griffiths - Finance Director;Kevin Oliver – Engineering Director.

Factory premises

The facility comprises a design office, employing 3D Ideas software, and a suite of cleanrooms 100,000 (approximately 10,000 sq. ft) and a large cleanroom 10,000 with localised laminar flows to take it up to 100,000 (approximately 10,000 sq. ft). Installed within the larger cleanroom area are a number of wire bonders including gold and aluminium wedge and gold ball; an automatic die placement machine with epoxy dispenser from Datacon and a Zevatech pick 'n place machine with a maximum capability of 7,000cph.

A separate saw room houses five dicing saws and a further GLA cleanroom (class 1,000) complete with it's own bonding and dispensing facilities will handle up to between 25-50,000 units per month, depending on the size of the package, with discussions to supply up to 1,000,000 units per month to Asia currently taking place.

Product range

In the early days it pioneered the first self scanning photodiode array chips for camera systems. These camera systems were subsequently installed in gauges used in heavy metal engineering which led the company to launch it's rotating Orbis gauge and was instrumental in IPL receiving The Queen's Award for Industry.

Today, the opto-electronic division also specialises in producing multi-layer cavity packages for the semi-conductor industry. They are also working towards micro BGA in an effort to reduce real estate that would be occupied by other types of packages.

Large module projects account for 30-40% of IPL's business. These modules are used in a variety of applications such as special light pens, used to detect hidden markings on packages by firing certain frequencies at the label. The company also supplies a range of in-line diagnostic systems and software for testing the devices.

Among recent products to be released is a range of self-regulating emitters for LED's. These are particularly useful for applications such as gas monitors, blood monitors etc.

Even more recently the company has launched a Low Profile Illumination (LPI) package, called HI-LYTE, which provides exceptionally high luminosity. The product consists of a fixed array of LED's that offer a well-defined angle of emission, the design of which removes the need for extensive positioning adjustment normally required with an array of discreet LED's. By appropriate reflector design the HI- LYTE can be manufactured to provide illumination ranging from a concentrated low divergent, through to a wide angle near Lambertian distribution in a low profile design and in a variety of colours.

The manufacturing design and process allows the HI-LYTE to be made to suit the customer's individual requirements, providing a very compact solution and a lifetime expectation well in excess of 50,000 hours. The low divergent units have been tested in daylight conditions over distances in excess of 3km.

The standard technology demonstrator unit is 163mm x 62mm x 9.5mm in size and has flying lead connections. The design of the product can be customised to meet specific requirements for size, shape and wavelength ranging from 380nm to 940nm including whites and dual colours.

Developed to deliver ultra low profile illuminators for the automotive industry, HI-LYTE has found numerous new markets in machine vision applications, telecommunications, industrial control, medical and the aerospace sectors.

The HI-LYTE Low Profile Illuminator begins life as a transparent substrate onto which conductors are deposited. LED die are then chip and wire bonded to the conductor layer and then a multifaceted array of contiguous parabolic reflectors in a single moulding is then added to complete the assembly, collectively known as "Paracog Technology".

Conclusion

IPL is a small, but dynamic jewel in the Dorset countryside. It's state-of-the-art facilities and highly trained workforce leave it well placed to handle a variety of optoelectronic packaging projects, from concept through to high volume production.