From IMAPS DPC 2025: How Arizona's Universities and Schools Are Revolutionizing Semiconductor Education

Arizona is transforming into the "Silicon Oasis" of America through an unprecedented collaboration that's reshaping semiconductor education from high school through graduate studies. At the heart of this revolution is a groundbreaking partnership between the University of Arizona and Chandler Unified School District, launching the nation's first high school career and technical education program focused on semiconductor manufacturing.

Starting July 2025, forty students will begin a two-year journey learning on industry-grade equipment—not "glorified children's toys" but actual mechatronic systems, universal robots, and PCB printing technology. What makes this program revolutionary is its design for multiple pathways; graduates can either enter the workforce immediately as technicians or continue to higher education with college credits already earned.

Meanwhile, Arizona State University is building the advanced end of this educational pipeline through CHIPS Act-funded initiatives like the Southwest Advanced Prototyping Hub and the SHIELD project. Graduate courses in semiconductor packaging have exploded in popularity, growing from just 27 students to over 175 in two years. The university is getting creative with outreach too, developing a "Packaging on Wheels" mobile facility to bring semiconductor education to schools nationwide.

The strength of Arizona's approach lies in its extensive industry involvement. Fifteen major companies form the steering committee for the high school program, providing real-world problems and case studies. Students from diverse backgrounds—electrical, mechanical, materials science, and chemical engineering—all find pathways into this multidisciplinary field.

As one industry expert notes, students with hands-on, industry-specific training demonstrate markedly better performance both during interviews and on the job. This educational ecosystem is creating not just the chips of tomorrow, but the workforce that will design, build, and innovate them. 

Contact Our Guests on LinkedIn: 

• Scott Hayes, NXP
• Liesl Folks, University of Arizona
• Janet Hartkopf, Chandler Unified School District
• Chris Bailey, ASU
• Pallavi Praful, ASU 
• Rohit Gandhi, ASU 

IMAPS Device Packaging Conference
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Chapters

• 0:00 IMAPS Sponsorship Introduction
• 0:43 Chandler Unified School District Partnership
• 6:46 Creating a Semiconductor Education Pipeline
• 12:58 Industry Support and Student Benefits
• 19:49 ASU's Semiconductor Education Initiatives
• 28:23 CHIPS Act Funding and Research Projects
• 36:19 Career Paths in Semiconductor Engineering
• 42:36 Podcast Closing

Transcript

Françoise von Trapp: 0:00

This episode of the 3D Insights podcast is sponsored by IMAPS, the premier global association for microelectronics advanced packaging enthusiasts. A membership in IMAPS helps your company grow its advanced packaging workforce through professional education and networking, advances your brand and supports building relationships. Imaps helps you learn, connect and collaborate. Learn more at IM imapsorg. Hi there, I'm Francoise von Trapp and this is the 3D Insights Podcast. Hi everyone. This episode was recorded live at the 2025 IMAPS Device Packaging Conference, where one of the key topics was on the importance of an industry, academia and government collaboration in building a solid semiconductor ecosystem in the United States, and we were fortunate to be joined by delegations from both ASU and the University of Arizona and the Chandler Unified School District to learn more about the academia's involvement in building the ecosystem here in Arizona. My guests on the podcast are Lisa Foulkes and Janet Harpoff and Scott Hayes. Welcome to the podcast, thank you, thank you.

Françoise von Trapp: 1:20

Great to be here, Janet. You're with the Chandler Unified School District. That's correct, Liesl. You're with the Chandler Unified School District.

Janet Hartkopf: 1:24

That's correct.

Françoise von Trapp: 1:25

Liesl you're with the University of Arizona and Scott you're here representing IMAPS Microelectronics Foundation. Can you tell me a little bit about yourselves and your roles?

Scott Hayes: 1:36

Scott Hayes, thank you for the introduction. My role here at IMAPS is as the Director of Foundations. The Microelectronics Foundation is as the director of foundations the Microelectronics Foundation and our mission statement is to promote student engagement in microelectronics packaging. So part of that is driving student engagement. Part of my responsibilities last year was general chair of the device packaging conference. Now I'm past general chair, but what I was doing a few months back was helping Amy Lujan, our current general chair, set up our technical program. We needed some invited speakers, potential keynote speakers, and I thought at that point to probably reach out to some of our major local universities. We had some engagement last year with Arizona State and I wanted to reach out to the University of Arizona, my alma mater, bear down.

Scott Hayes: 2:25

I'm going to throw that plug in there too. But, that's where I made the initial connection with Liesl. He's very forthcoming with some names invited speakers Robert Norwood he's going to be a session chair for one of our curated sessions, and Dr Matt Eichenfield will be giving an invited lecture on photonics later. So then from there, the communication continued and began a little more student outreach, and we were able to drive the engagement a little bit further. I'll let them tell the rest of the story, though.

Françoise von Trapp: 2:53

Okay, liesl, can you explain a little bit about the University of Arizona's initiative?

Liesl Folks: 2:59

Sure, I am a professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Arizona, but I took the initiative in 2023 to establish the Center for Semiconductor Manufacturing at the University of Arizona, which was an effort to pull together a really collaborative and coordinated response from the university to support the expansion of semiconductor manufacturing here in the state of Arizona and, of course, around the nation.

Liesl Folks: 3:27

So we're pretty excited to see more and more advanced packaging happening in the state of Arizona and in the US, and the University of Arizona has a long, long story and track record of contributing new innovations to packaging in fields like materials science and engineering, for example, but also chemical engineering, electrical engineering and so forth. So we have a lot of interested faculty who are working in the field and students who are really excited to think about what their careers might look like as they think about coming into the semiconductor sector. That also led us into a terrific engagement with Chandler Unified School District, in which we're building the nation's first career and technical education program, which is a two-year program to introduce students to semiconductor manufacturing, and that's how we end up in a partnership with Chandler Unified School District and Janet as we collaborate to build that program, which launches in July 2025, which is just around the corner.

Françoise von Trapp: 4:34

Okay, so that brings us to Janet.

Janet Hartkopf: 4:36

Hello, I'm the coordinator for emerging technologies with Chandler Unified School District, so my job involves starting our new and exciting programs, and Semiconductor is one of them, and so I met Liesl, as she said, in 2023, when they began their initiative, and I was told by a colleague of mine from U of A hey, you need to come down. So I did, and the rest is history. So we are working on the nation's first two-year career and technical education program for high schoolers. I'm excited to say that right now, we have 40 students who will be beginning that journey in July. We're really excited about opening up the space at Hamilton High School in Chandler and ordering equipment all the exciting things that are happening right now. And just being here, part of IMAPS, is a great education experience for me Meeting vendors and companies that have already offered hey, can we come in and speak, and things like that. So it's just been an awesome experience.

Françoise von Trapp: 5:37

So this is a program, a two-year program at the high school level.

Janet Hartkopf: 5:40

Yes, ma'am.

Françoise von Trapp: 5:41

So they are learning this way before they normally would have. I mean, and this isn't just an engineering program, this is actually a semiconductor program.

Janet Hartkopf: 5:51

Yeah.

Françoise von Trapp: 5:51

That's fantastic. So now U of A is down in Tucson, mostly right, but you do have satellite campuses.

Liesl Folks: 5:57

Yeah, we have a campus in Chandler already, and Chandler is, if you like, ground zero for the semiconductor sector in the state of Arizona.

Françoise von Trapp: 6:09

That would make sense Right Home of NXP, home of Intel.

Liesl Folks: 6:13

Microchip has long had facilities here, motorola's been here and lots and lots of suppliers to the industry have established.

Françoise von Trapp: 6:24

If they're not originally from there, they have established a presence in the Chandler area. So it really is kind of like you know they keep calling it the Silicon Desert. I like to think of it as the Silicon Oasis.

Liesl Folks: 6:35

I love that. I like that better Isn't that so much better.

Françoise von Trapp: 6:37

Because the desert desert's like dry. But I'm told that Dubai has claimed Silicon Oasis.

Liesl Folks: 6:44

So we're going to have some work to do to reclaim that. So I want to give a shout out to the city of Chandler, which has been tremendously supportive of the industry but indeed very supportive of our efforts to build improved educational pathways for people into the semiconductor sector. So we've had a lot of support from the city as well, which we really appreciate.

Françoise von Trapp: 7:10

So how are the students responding to this opportunity? You said you already have 40 students enrolled and do they actually get to go in?

Janet Hartkopf: 7:20

and you know, are they working in like a clean room environment or manufacturing environment, because you talked about ordering tools they're not going to go into a clean room environment, but we are going to have some very exciting tools in there, and so we're going to have a mechatronic system, an eight-piece mechatronic system. We'll have a universal robot. They'll work on soldering. They're going to work with different pneumatics and vacuum system.

Liesl Folks: 7:46

PCB board printer Exactly exactly so.

Janet Hartkopf: 7:50

Part of a CTE program is that 51% of the curriculum is hands-on, so again, over half of it will be tangible, hands-on experiences with different types of machinery, industry-grade machinery, not glorified children's toys, but so that when the students are done with the program they are able to go into industry as a Tier 1 tech-level technician if they choose to, or they can go to the community college or on to the university. The important thing at the high school level is to ensure that you have multiple pathways for whichever direction that student wants to go and they're prepared, and that's one of the things that we've done very purposefully in building this is that the curriculum is broad enough that, should the semiconductor industry, you know, have a little bit of a lull, that the students still have someplace to go and relatable industries lull, that the students still have someplace to go in relatable industries.

Françoise von Trapp: 8:47

Okay, so many questions. So what is U of A providing to support this?

Liesl Folks: 8:57

So we have all the technical expertise, if you like. So we're partnering with Chandler to build curriculum and Chandler, of course, is the voice for this is what's the appropriate level of content for each of the pieces of the curriculum. But my faculty is coming to the table and saying here's what we want to teach in each of the 16 different core units that we have as part of the technical curriculum. I want to give another shout out to NXP, because NXP really helped us to get started by showing us what they had done with Austin Community College, with the STARS program which you might have heard of because it's had quite a lot of good publicity which was to take working adults and give them a four and a half week immersion to get them ready for entry-level technician roles.

Liesl Folks: 9:46

So we have worked with Austin Community College. We've absorbed their curriculum for technician training. We've wrapped around that more content that is grounded in basic science, applied math and critical reasoning skills. So they've got a four and a half week full-time program. Ours is a two-year program, so we've got more time and a slower pace of learning. So you're dealing with younger and we're dealing with younger students.

Liesl Folks: 10:16

So we're adapting the level of learning to the grade level of the students and then bolstering it with science, math and critical reasoning, and that is a really important skill that's not being taught very much these days, so I'm really happy to see you saying that.

Françoise von Trapp: 10:31

So students will be getting their full high school curriculum.

Janet Hartkopf: 10:34

In addition Is this an add-on, it's an elective, it's an elective.

Françoise von Trapp: 10:38

Okay. So, scott, your role at NXP. You were talking about your role at IMAPS, but you also work for NXP, so how much has NXP been involved in this and supporting this?

Scott Hayes: 10:50

Thank you. I volunteer a lot of time with IMAPS. I talk about the foundation a bit. My full-time job is as technical director at NXP, focusing on advanced packaging, so we're kind of the industry recipients of this eventually, right? So we've had involvement in some of these workforce development programs and providing some guest lecturers and providing some support here and there. What I want to really talk about is the difference that we see in students that have these hands-on types of experiences. We routinely hire interns. We're hiring new college graduates regularly and it is an obvious difference in the candidates that we see and the students that are coming for employment, those that have had the hands-on experience and those that have had the formal training specific to our industry and even more specifically these days to advance packaging. It's a remarkable difference in the candidates, not just at the interviewing level but then also subsequently performance on the job. So that's a really big benefit to the employee population coming along in Arizona and the US as a whole.

Françoise von Trapp: 11:57

So there's a huge advantage to the industry to support this, because you're basically creating a talent pipeline from the ground up.

Françoise von Trapp: 12:06

Yeah, exactly I mean, we've been talking about the workforce shortage in this industry and I think initially there was a lot of tapping into either at the university level or, you know, veterans is another source but for a long time we've been talking about how we really need to excite these students at a younger and younger age, that they're making their decisions long before they go into high school, and I've talked to some high school kids at IMAPS events who are like I started in the robotics club in fourth grade and have known since the fourth grade. And Janet, you work in a K through 12 environment, I do. You work in a K-12 environment, I do. At what age do you think it's good to start introducing these kids to this opportunity that they'll have when they get to high school, or how is that being handled?

Janet Hartkopf: 12:54

You know, if it was me, I would start infusing careers as soon as we could, as soon as we could. But that being said, 6th, 7th grade absolutely. I know at Chandler we're revising our junior high program to make it career-centric, and so our students will be receiving more direct instruction as far as different careers that are available, including semiconductors. So I'm building my own pipeline within the school districts as well, and part of that is also educating our teachers, our staff, our counselors and everybody about the potential. I simply cannot reach everybody, and so if I educate other teachers about these opportunities, they can talk to their students as they see them gravitating towards certain things and talking to them about those careers as well.

Françoise von Trapp: 13:41

Yeah, that is great. So, in addition to a career path directly out of school, obviously you mentioned that some of them will go on to community college or even a four year program. So are they already earning credits in high school towards that?

Janet Hartkopf: 13:57

Yes, they will be. It's kind of exciting. I'm going to let Dr Folks talk about that one though.

Liesl Folks: 14:01

Sure, we're in a terrific relationship with Maricopa Community Colleges. In particular, we've got a terrific colleague, Rick Vaughn, who works at Rio Salado College, who's helping us frame up what the certificate is that the students will be awarded for completing the high school program, which is a technical certification, and they will get college credit for the work that they've done in the high school program which they can take with them into a community college program if that's their preference, or into one of the universities in the state of Arizona system, so that's Northern Arizona University, Arizona State University or the University of Arizona. They can take those college credits with them and pursue a bachelor's degree, hopefully also master's degrees and PhDs, because we need workers from across the entire educational spectrum program that's been initiated and working with U of A, they would actually come out being eligible to go at any of the you know.

Françoise von Trapp: 15:09

their credits would transfer to any of the universities in the system. So here's the big question how is this all being funded? Sure.

Liesl Folks: 15:16

The University of Arizona is extremely grateful to the Arizona Commerce Authority for providing funding that got us going and gave us some bandwidth to kick this off, and just full credit to the ACA for helping us get this going. But the Chandler Unified School District is buying equipment and renovating a space for us to kick this off. We have an enormous amount of in-kind support from 15 major companies here in the state of Arizona who form our steering committee. So we have agreements with all of them that they are going to help us shape that curriculum and they are giving us data sets and real-world situations that we can bring into the classroom so that students can grapple with real-world problems that have a technical component, a basic science component, an applied math component and critical reasoning component in the form of case studies or different types of structures in terms of the pedagogy. But they're rich problems for students to grapple with so they can start to understand the complexity of working in the semiconductor sector, where every day is a new challenge I can share from deep experience.

Françoise von Trapp: 16:38

That's what makes it so fun and exciting right is that you're not going to do the same thing every day? I mean, who likes that? I know some people do, Not many, Not many. But Scott, now NXP. You mentioned internships. Is this part of the program where, even at the high school level, these kids can get into internships?

Janet Hartkopf: 16:55

I'm going to say, and then I'm going to defer to Scott, that normally a student needs to be 18 years old because of insurance reasons and liability student needs to be 18 years old because of insurance reasons and liability.

Scott Hayes: 17:08

Our typical internship model is one of at least a year of experience within undergrad and typically our typical intern will have a couple of more years experience after that. But we're always looking for students who we will be able to give an opportunity to. I always liken it to an extended interview for both parties, for the company as well as for the student. It needs to be a good fit long term. So the internships we always look at them as a stepping stone towards full-time employment. You know, if it's going to work out for the company and it's also going to work out for the individual engineer or technician, for that matter, then it's a good fit.

Scott Hayes: 17:43

You know, the model for engagement with high school I don't think has been well developed at this point between industry and high schools and I look forward to leveraging our foundation here at IMAPS, as well as some industry involvement, to figure out what that model needs to look like for greatest success, because this is a pathway into industry or pathway into higher education. This is a pathway into industry or pathway into higher education, and the semiconductor industry in the United States is getting into a bit of a rebirth phase right now, so this all needs to work well together. No-transcript. Hopefully that's a strong indication.

Françoise von Trapp: 18:20

Well, I think this is amazing. This is a beautiful example of we don't have government sitting here right now, but you mentioned the ACA. We've got industry, we've got academia and how this whole ecosystem is coming together to really solve a very large challenge in this industry. What else do we need to know?

Liesl Folks: 18:39

So one of the exciting features of the career and technical education program that we're building is Janet already said it's first in the nation, but we're building it digitally so that as soon as we've launched it we're able to expand it to other school districts around the nation. So we're really excited to be able to share with other communities that want to be able to bring their students into the semiconductor sector. A really a ready-made pathway for them to bring students into a high school program and get them ready to pathway into the semiconductor sector.

Françoise von Trapp: 19:09

Where can people go to learn more? Is there one central website area or?

Liesl Folks: 19:14

something Sure. You can check out our website at the Center for Semiconductor Manufacturing at the University of Arizona. If you type CSM Arizona, it will pop right up, and we've got all of these activities summarized there and, of course, all of our research and development projects that are underway as well. So there's this and much, much more, but it's terrific to be able to talk about this program. We're really excited to see it launch in a few months.

Françoise von Trapp: 19:41

So thank you all for joining me today.

Janet Hartkopf: 19:44

Thank you, thank you.

Françoise von Trapp: 19:49

Okay, so my next guests are from Arizona State University. I'm speaking with Chris Bailey.

Chris Bailey: 19:56

Research professor at Arizona State University, joined ASU two years ago. Before that I was based over in London in the UK, but 25 years plus researching into packaging, electronic packaging, semiconductor packaging, all the EDA and modeling and simulation that goes with that thermal management reliability. So delighted to be here at ASU and I'm leading up on the packaging activities at ASU with regards to research and workforce development.

Françoise von Trapp: 20:33

Okay, and we will circle back to that. Can you introduce your students for me? Are these both your students? Yes, they are.

Chris Bailey: 20:41

So I'd like to introduce Pallavi Praful. Yes, and Pallavi joined me just over a year ago. Pallavi, would you like to say a few things about?

Pallavi Praful: 20:53

yourself. So hello everyone. I'm Pallavi Praful. I'm a second year PhD student at ASU and I work with Dr Chris Bailey at ASU. My focus of my PhD research is advanced semiconductor packaging modeling and simulation. So I have an undergraduate degree in electrical engineering and a master's degree from UK Heriot-Watt University in Smart Systems Integration. So this course was all about MEMS design, sensor design, and I did quite a bit of modeling and simulation there. So now I use that skills in advanced packaging analysis.

Françoise von Trapp: 21:37

Okay, great, and we have.

Chris Bailey: 21:40

Rohit Gandhi, who again has attended some of my courses and is doing research looking at RDL layers and their behavior.

Rohit Ghandi: 21:53

Is that right? Yeah, so I did my bachelor's back in India and I did my master's and I'm doing my first year PhD here in ASU under Dr Chris Bailey. And I'm doing my first year PhD here in ASU under Dr Chris Bailey. I'm a mechanical engineer by heart and it's kind of a different feel for me because until and unless I attended Dr Bailey's co-design and packaging class, I never knew that this electronic design is not just for electrical people, it's kind of co-design, it's for mechanical material science and mechanical engineers as well. So I'm doing my PhD in reliability analysis of advanced packaging, particularly focuses, as Dr Bailey mentioned, in RDL days.

Françoise von Trapp: 22:35

That gives me a great question for the three of you. None of you are Arizona natives. None of you started your winter school here. What brought you to Arizona and ASU to pursue this next part of your careers?

Chris Bailey: 22:49

I was very aware of the sort of ecosystem here in Phoenix and the Arizona region. In actual fact, 30 years ago when I started my career, all the papers I was reading in packaging was by Amcor, based here in Phoenix. So what I have seen over the last few years is significant growth in the semiconductor industry here, building on what was already here, and certainly we've seen that with TSMC Amcor building a big facility here for packaging and what with the CHIPS Act here in the US. I was aware of that a couple of years ago and once I was approached by ASU to consider moving here, I certainly gave that a lot of thoughts and made the decision. It's actually quite nice here weather-wise.

Françoise von Trapp: 23:45

It is. It's a little toasty in the summer. We just completed our hottest year on record.

Chris Bailey: 23:54

You could be thermally cycled. A few times I have been actually going back and forward from London to here, but most of the time it is a great place to live.

Françoise von Trapp: 24:02

If you can get out of here in the summer, it's delightful. So the two of you, Rohit and Pallavi, what brought you to Arizona?

Rohit Ghandi: 24:10

Speaking about me, I worked a lot with cooling during my bachelor's and I wanted to work in cooling.

Françoise von Trapp: 24:18

So you came to the hottest place on earth. I'm just kidding.

Rohit Ghandi: 24:22

So I realized ASU has published a lot of research in electronic schooling.

Scott Hayes: 24:26

And.

Rohit Ghandi: 24:26

Intel has been a great partner with ASU for a really long time and Intel at Phoenix has done a lot of research in electronic schooling. So that was my initial motivation to get into my master's program. And later I realized, oh my God, it's a whole ecosystem here. You have a TSMC, now you have Amcor, and it's kind of a very different field now to be in packaging.

Pallavi Praful: 24:49

And Pallavi. I completed my master's in UK in 2021. In census, you don't have a lot of advanced packaging mostly, but I was made aware of this field by a professor that I work closely with in UK and I learned more about ASU and Arizona and I saw that there were a lot of leaders in the advanced packaging space located in Arizona. So, yeah, that was my main motivation to move into Arizona. And how do you like it? I really like it a lot, uh. So I I was raised in dubai, so I feel the climate is very uh similar and I feel there's a lot of uh similar minded folks working in my field, so it's very easy for me to network being in arizona. Uh, that has been a big plus point.

Chris Bailey: 25:41

Yeah, another major attraction to come here was the Macro Technology Works facility.

Françoise von Trapp: 25:49

This is fairly new, though, right.

Chris Bailey: 25:51

Well, no, Macro Technology Works facility at ASU has been there for over 20 years. It was originally built as a Motorola fab. The scale is quite large in the capabilities we have there, but it's been able to work with industry scale tools and we're working very closely with DECA. So a whole 300mm fan outweigh for the packaging pilot line for students to work with as well as other facilities across ASU. But having that sort of scale to do research on and thinking about how you can bridge that gap from lab to fab, that facility is quite unique for research as well as workforce development.

Françoise von Trapp: 26:39

So a year ago at IMAPS TPC, we interviewed Zach Holman about the Swap Hub, which you're a part of. Can you update us on that and other activities that are happening here as a result of this effort to build the ecosystem in Arizona between the industry partners and the local government, the ACA and ASU?

Chris Bailey: 27:02

So the SWAP hub, the Southwest Advanced Prototyping Hub, is one of the microelectronics commons hubs which was funded under the CHIPS Act. There was $2 billion set aside to support these hubs, so that's been running for over a year now. It has 190 plus members, so really facilitating this collaboration with industry Within the Swap Hub. Heterogeneous integration is one of the core capabilities, so we're looking at heterogeneous integration and other capabilities and looking at those innovations for systems for the aerospace and defense markets. Five projects are running, so, as well as funding to support the capabilities, we have five projects in AI hardware, 5g, 6g and leap ahead technologies. So that's running very well. The infrastructure is all being built up, which includes the DECA pilot line for packaging, so that's one of the big projects we've had in the last two years. The other one that was recently announced, at the end of last year, was the SHIELD project.

Françoise von Trapp: 28:24

Right, and SHIELD is an acronym and it stands for.

Chris Bailey: 28:28

Substrate-based heterogeneous integration leading to advances in the US.

Françoise von Trapp: 28:34

Okay, and is this also funded under the CHIPS and Science Act?

Chris Bailey: 28:38

Yes, it is so. As part of the CHIPS and Science Act there was the NAPMP program and the research part of that and the first call for research projects. The aim there was to fund three types of substrate developments very innovative substrates. Types of substrate developments very innovative substrates One would be on organics, one on glass and one on silicon as being the core parts of the substrate. So ASU was successful with DECA in achieving a $100 million award to use fan at wafer-level packaging technology to develop these very advanced substrates. Now, both within the SWAT club and SHIELD, there are workforce development activities.

Françoise von Trapp: 29:34

Okay, and so can you explain a little bit about the workforce development, Because that is one of the big issues right now is you know? We have this industry that's on explosive growth tracks. The demand is there. Some of the challenges are not just having the infrastructure and the fabs available, but also the workforce to run those fabs. So what is ASU doing to help grow that workforce?

Chris Bailey: 30:04

Well as Pallavi and Rohit were mentioning. Pallavi is an electrical engineer, rohit's a mechanical engineer. So with regards to workforce developments, I've been quite pleased over the last two years. A number of new grad courses at ASU. The first course in fundamentals of semiconductor packaging, year one, started with 27 students. It's been taught this semester. It's now 17.

Françoise von Trapp: 30:34

That's excellent. It's not just about being an engineer, it's understanding the application of what you're learning into industry. And you have different paths you could have taken and you're both pursuing a semiconductor well, an advanced packaging path.

Chris Bailey: 30:47

Exactly exactly, and the other one that Rohit mentioned, co-design and modeling very core, underpinning technology for advanced packaging. That started with 30 and was 50 last semester, so it's great to see growth there. And then, as within our graduate programs, we have developed micro-credentials stackable micro-credentials as we call them and we're teaching those to support workforce development. So that's being developed under the SWAP Hub and being taken forward through what is the ITSE program funded by the Department of State. And with regard to SHIELD, this is exciting because a whole number of other courses that we're looking at.

Chris Bailey: 31:37

Reliability is really important, so we're working with other institutions like the University of Maryland as part of the SHIELD project, but we're also setting up a teaching I call it a surface mount technology line, but it will be more than that. This will allow students to have hands-on experience in packaging processes as well as the characterization of those packages and reliability of those packages. So this SMT line will be funded under SHIELD and be used for hands-on experience and to outreach to win hearts and minds, going right back to K-12, you know. So this is high schools and train the trainer, as we call it. We are putting together what we call packaging on wheels. So this is going to be a bus-type facility with packaging equipment on there. We'll be taking that to science fairs around the country, visiting high schools and you think about Arizona reaching those places where many very, potentially very bright students and members of the workforce of the future. They may never come to Phoenix, they may never see what's going on here. So we'll reach out to them.

Françoise von Trapp: 33:01

So we've been talking a lot about the CHIPS Act funding, and the elephant in the room with the administration shift is will this CHIPS Act funding be gutted and how much of it have you already received? Does CHIPS Act funding be gutted and how much of it have you already received, and what is going?

Chris Bailey: 33:23

to make it assure that you're going to get the rest of the funding that you've been promised. Well, I just mentioned two very significant projects the SWAP Hub and the SHIELD project. So ASU has been incredibly successful as an academic institution within the CHIPS Act initiatives. Now you think about the CHIPS Act, it's very much about reshoring.

Françoise von Trapp: 33:43

Right.

Chris Bailey: 33:44

Reshoring that capability, because the most advanced capabilities need to be here in the US, and with companies like DECA, well, they're here. So how do we build on that? Right, so it is about shoring in and, francois, there's numerous ways I guess that you could think about how to encourage companies to build here. But the other big part of the CHIPS Act was to support the companies that are here with science and innovation. Right? So the research side.

Françoise von Trapp: 34:16

And advanced packaging especially.

Chris Bailey: 34:18

And it is a very big part of the research agenda because, if we think about packaging for HPC and AI, well, Moore's Law has been running out of steam for some time, so the innovation is going to be happening with the packaging and packaging innovation in other areas as well. So your question about future funding currently very successful at ASU significant amounts of funding supporting our infrastructure and research. Rohit here is actually working on an SRC project that we recently received and, most importantly, it's this engagement of industry, isn't it? And this is all enabling right.

Chris Bailey: 35:02

But you've got to be able to support the research and innovation. There is NSF, there is other types of programs here in the US, but I do think that part of the CHIPS Act would, I assume, naturally proceed whatever happens elsewhere. But I would imagine that would continue and certainly we're really working hard on the current projects. We have to ensure that they do.

Françoise von Trapp: 35:30

So you've received some of that funding already.

Chris Bailey: 35:32

Oh, under the SWap, Hub and the Shield projects. Yes, they have been funded. We have started and we are progressing as to plan on those.

Françoise von Trapp: 35:44

Well, here's hoping it all sticks.

Chris Bailey: 35:46

And also Francois. Look what's going on in Europe and elsewhere. I mean it's happening, they're moving ahead and we need to do that in the US as well, absolutely Like I say with regards to encouraging companies to invest. Numerous ways of doing that and I understand that. But the science, the innovation, the research, you have to support that.

Françoise von Trapp: 36:10

And just before we wrap up, I want to ask each of you, rohit and Alavi. And just before we wrap up, I want to ask each of you, rohit and Alavi, what would you say to students thinking about what to do with their STEM education and how they could you know if you had any advice to give?

Pallavi Praful: 36:25

Yes, so I believe that one thing that brought me to the semiconductor industry was that I tried to be very strong in my fundamentals. In like physics and math. Chemistry was not such a strong subject for me, but being very strong in your fundamentals can get you like really far ahead in your STEM. A lot of technology might change, but it will give you the ability to adapt quite quickly. And, yeah, semiconductor packaging is a very multidisciplinary platform. There's a lot of work for material science engineers, mechanical engineers, electrical and chemical engineers. Whatever STEM field you're pursuing right now, pursue it very passionately, yeah, and try to just explore some problems in semiconductor industry right now, and if you feel interested, then definitely pursue that.

Rohit Ghandi: 37:21

I kind of have a different opinion on that one. Regarding fundamentals, I always think about how can I apply stuff. If I have to give an advice whenever I read a topic, how can I apply this in my life, even if in these lectures? How can I use this in my PhD dissertation? How can I use this? So, based on this application perspective, I think you can really find a value. How can I use this skill and how can I contribute myself to the industry? So, for example, when I had good understanding of thermal background, I thought how can I apply this in semiconductor industry? So I really found my way and that is how I think it is becoming more and more important. And how can I get benefit? Rather, how can I benefit the community? How can a skill that I have can help build this organization? So I think finding a value and using your skill to apply that value would help you.

Françoise von Trapp: 38:17

Excellent, excellent. When you both started out on your path, your career path in university was semiconductor industry on your mind already.

Rohit Ghandi: 38:27

Not at all for me.

Pallavi Praful: 38:28

For me perhaps because I did my undergraduate in electronics, so a lot of interest for my fellow classmates was in the transistor, the silicon design and software development like coding, embedded devices for code devices etc. Yeah, everybody was focused a lot on the silicon design and a lot of them have turned out to be like analog design engineers etc in that field. But we weren't very aware of advanced packaging. But through my master's and other platforms I have been very informed about the innovation happening in this field.

Rohit Ghandi: 39:12

Personally, I was an IC engine guy. I'm a mechanical engineer since a kid. I was thinking about how can I use my skills to build vehicles. Then I really found a problem that cooling these vehicles is a big challenge, and particularly for EV industry. So I got passionate about that Then. From cooling electric vehicles to cooling ICs. That is how I transitioned myself. Okay, it was just a flow and luckily I found myself in this position. But yeah, I started with IC engine. Now I started with ICs.

Françoise von Trapp: 39:42

So, when you think about the opportunities that are being made available, the education or the the focus on semiconductor industry itself at younger and younger grades, if you you had had that, would that have been advantageous to you?

Pallavi Praful: 39:57

Yeah, I would definitely think so. It's very important to bring some sort of awareness to very young students about semiconductors, like, for instance. Now everybody, even kids, know about coding because they see software like websites and applications on their phone and generally you're curious like, how is this working? What's happening at the back end? Making them more aware about the hardware that holds the software, that would be really great and, yeah, especially for students who are very interested in the physics behind it's working and I have an opinion that there are really actually not a lot of awareness.

Rohit Ghandi: 40:37

When I came to ASU and I got involved in one of the research, that's how I got to know about the role of packaging. While joining ASU I didn't have a lot of understanding of packaging. So if I had that background it would have been really helpful, because even when I go back to India and talk with my batchmates, they think what are you doing in electronics industry? I was like how do you make this 5 nanometer transistor? You need processes, you need a lot of process engineers, you need a lot of development and R&D for that, and it's a field that everybody needs to collaborate. So if there was an awareness, it would have been really taken off with a very different approach.

Françoise von Trapp: 41:12

Last question when you're done with your studies, will you stay and look for work within the United States?

Pallavi Praful: 41:19

For me. Yes, I'm married, my husband's here and some of my family is also based in the US, and I also feel US is at the forefront of microelectronics development, so I really would like to carve out a career for myself in the US. Okay, rohit.

Rohit Ghandi: 41:37

Honestly, I'm not really sure about that. I want to build my skill set first in here and then maybe see if there is a big electronics market growing in India. Then I'll probably go back and see how things go.

Françoise von Trapp: 41:52

Well, I know they are trying to grow the semiconductor market there and advanced packaging. Chris, was there anything you wanted to add?

Chris Bailey: 42:00

It's great to work with students such as Pallavi and Rohitz, and packaging is an interdisciplinary area and within the Fulton Schools of Engineering at ASU, we've really got a good platform there to really develop the great packaging engineers of the future. I'm looking forward to continuing that.

Françoise von Trapp: 42:23

Excellent. Well, thank you again all for joining me today.

Chris Bailey: 42:26

Thank you.

Françoise von Trapp: 42:27

Kirsten, let's do it again sometime.

Chris Bailey: 42:29

Sure Sounds good, thank you.

Françoise von Trapp: 42:36

Next time on the 3D Insights Podcast. We've got the IMAPS DPC 3D Insights Member Spotlight featuring perspectives of 3D Insights member companies who participated in the IMAPS Device Packaging Conference. There's lots more to come, so tune in next time to the 3D Insights Podcast. The 3D Insights Podcast is a production of 3D Insights LLC.