Since Howard joined IMAPS back in 1969, he has made numerous technical and management presentations at a wide variety of venues. He now chairs the Global Business Council and an iNEMI Technology Working Group Roadmap.  He has served as Vice-President of the Garden State chapter and on the steering committees for five IMAPS Symposiums.

Throughout his career, Howard has long embraced volunteering in IMAPS programs at chapter, national, and international levels.  He notes, “Through my IMAPS participation, I gain targeted customer networking opportunities and great venues to share technical & market information from multiple levels of the microelectronics supply chain.”

For example: the success of Cermalloy, an electronic materials company that Howard co-founded, was based on a paper that Hughes Aircraft presented at an IMAPS International Symposium in 1970.  This paper described adjusting resistors with a high-voltage pulsed capacitor.  Taking this technical knowledge, Howard’s company marketed Cermalloy resistors to companies/products where high-voltage stability was required. This enabled Cermalloy to supply “focustats” in televisions.  Cermalloy’s business boomed and later led to its sale to Heraeus.

Jim Wood,  a Technical Service Engineer of Heraeus writes “Howard successfully integrated three corporate product lines of thick film for Heraeus to make it the dominant supplier of high-reliability resistor materials for most of the televisions manufactured in the late 1970s and early 1980s.  The resistor material enabled TVs to tune themselves rather than viewers having to tune TVs whenever they switched a channel.”  

In 2000, both IPC & NEMI inquired into the IMAPS’ Ceramic Interconnect Initiative (CII) to help them on their own respective roadmaps.  Howard volunteered to chair this effort and increased the participation of current  IMAPS leaders in it.  Under Howard’s leadership, this initiative both greatly promotes leading-edge technology to new markets and identifies gaps in existing technology, where solutions such as design rules and new software enable current applications to work more effectively.

Howards notes the value of roadmap participation by saying, “We all have limited development & marketing collateral - is your technology roadmap aligned with your core & potential customers?”

Mike Ehlert, a Senior Director at Barry Industries and IMAPS’ Past President, relates, “Howard has been a consistent and enthusiastic supporter of ceramic technology; he can be counted on to meet leadership requirements.  Howard  ensures the success of the CII through the regular re-writes of both the iNEMI Roadmap and the LTCC Standards SIG.”

As Chair of the Global Business Council, Howard emphasizes, “I believe the GBC should be a “must participate” industry network for every sales & marketing executive.  Participants at GBC events share a tremendous amount of information on business trends and emerging markets. GBC events also provide valuable networking opportunities with global participants.”   

Gary Nicholls, an OEM Marketing Manager for Cookson Electronics and a GBC committee member praises Howard’s GBC leadership, “Howard leads with style and energy to increase its teamwork and outreach.  As a co-chair of the Spring Conference, Howard improved its speaker sessions and social programs. I look forward to working with him on the 2009 Spring Conference to fulfill the ever changing needs of IMAPS corporate members”.

Howard looks forward to the next GBC event at the 41st International Symposium in Providence, RI.  The  event “Alternative Energy: Options, Supply Chains, and Industry Trends” will provide valuable industry insight on the business side of microelectronics in an expanding, global market segment.

Howard enjoying an IMAPS golf outing at Coyote Creek

Howard from the garage at the Pocono International Raceway

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