Mar 05, 2001 The KIC-Pilot automated reflow oven setup software has won the 2001 EP&P Excellence Award for Electronics Assembly Equipment and Accessories. The Excellence Awards, presented annually by EP&P Magazine, were established in 1989 to recognize the most innovative products in the electronics manufacturing industry. The winners of this award are selected by a panel of industry experts. The judges look for products that demonstrate a significant reduction in manufacturing costs, develop or apply a new technology successfully, offer improved yield or performance, exhibit a marked degree of uniqueness differentiating it from other products, or exemplify an ongoing commitment to improved quality engineering standards.
Gathering further accolades, KIC also was awarded the 2001 EP&P Grand Excellence Award. This award is given to the new product which received the highest overall score from the panel of industry experts.
These are the second and third consecutive awards for the KIC Pilot, which has won all major industry new products awards this year. In January, the KIC-Pilot won the SMT Vision Award for software.
The KIC Pilot is an automated reflow oven setup system that interfaces directly with the oven controller. The Pilot features an animation-based user interface which allows a low-skilled operator with one hour's training to setup the reflow process. The process engineer retains overall control by defining the process parameters, but can delegate the actual setup tasks to the line operators. The Pilot guarantees error-free operations and determines the ONE BEST possible oven setup.
Until now, the operator has been responsible for controlling the oven. With the Pilot software, the oven has the intelligence to tell the operator how to set it up, and will not allow the operator to run product if the profile is out of spec. In effect, the KIC Pilot's intelligent system controls the operator.
Based in San Diego, KIC is the industry leader in automated thermal process tools and systems for reflow, wave, curing and semiconductor thermal processes. The company pioneered the development of oven profilers and process optimization tools, and then worked to create the next generation of thermal systems to help manufacturers improve the thermal process quality while reducing cost.
KIC products include the KIC X5, KICstart2, ProBot and the KIC RPI. With the introduction of cutting edge tools, the company continues to stay on the leading edge of process optimization and automatic thermal process systems, and has won numerous industry awards.
