Silicon lane
Wire bonding and failure analysis
Between a university cleanroom you need badge access to enter and an OSAT that will not quote under a few thousand…
$30 to $80 per chip, decap from $75
01
What you get
Assembly and rework at $200 to $400 per board. SMT placement, hand rework, and BGA removal and reball. No lot minimum and no per-order setup fee, because the machine is already set up and you are not competing with a panel of a thousand.
A thermal scan for $100 to $150. Power the board on the bench under an infrared camera and the part that is dissipating more than it should shows up immediately. This finds in ten minutes what a week of probing does not.
Laser marking and serialization at $5 to $15 per part, so the boards that leave carry a traceable identity.
02
What it replaces
The offshore quick-turn houses quote one to three weeks door to door once you count shipping, customs and the revision you did not catch. Their unit economics are excellent at volume and irrelevant at five boards.
The alternative locally is a contract manufacturer with a lot minimum and a sales cycle. For a startup respinning a board twice a month, neither is the right shape.
The gap is a machine within driving distance that will run five boards this afternoon at a posted price. That is the whole thesis.
03
How it works
Send Gerbers, a centroid file and a bill of materials. Bring or ship the boards and parts, or have them drop-shipped here. You get the assembled boards plus a short written record of what was placed, what was reworked and anything that looked wrong.
The counter is not open yet. Prices are posted in advance and held at opening.
04
Rates
Posted before opening, not after. Build a full order on the rate board.
Same-day PCB assembly and rework$200-400 per board
Board thermal scan, find the hot part$100-150
Laser marking and serialization$5-15 per part
05
Common questions
How fast is same-day PCB assembly really?
Boards brought in the morning with parts on hand go back the same day. The constraint is part availability, not machine time. If a component is on a three-week lead time, no shop can beat that.
Is there a minimum order for PCB assembly?
No. Five boards is a normal job and one board is an acceptable one. There is no lot minimum and no setup fee, which is the main difference from a contract manufacturer.
What files do you need for a PCB assembly job?
Gerbers, a centroid or pick-and-place file, and a bill of materials with manufacturer part numbers. A board outline and fiducials help. If you only have a KiCad or Altium project, that works too.
06
Other lanes
Verify lane
EMC pre-compliance and environmental test
Failing a certified EMC chamber is expensive twice: once for the chamber day and again for the schedule. A pre-scan…
$400 to $600 per scan
Repair lane
Lab instrument repair and calibration
A dead incubator is not a hard engineering problem. It is a scheduling problem. The OEM wants six hundred dollars and…
$395 flat rate
Robotics lane
Actuator and joint characterization
Actuator datasheets are marketing documents. Peak torque is quoted at a duty cycle nobody runs and thermal derating…
$1,500 to $3,000 per report