IPC to develop data exchange standard

IPC, an ANSI-accredited standards development organization, will be developing a data exchange standard to assist the electronics manufacturing industry fulfil the imminent U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulations on conflict minerals with the participation of a broad stakeholder group. The IPC data exchange standard will build upon the due diligence communication tool by the Electronic Industry Citizenship Coalition (EICC) and Global e-Sustainability Initiative (GeSI) and use the XML schema incorporated in the IPC-175x family of IPC standards.

Under Section 1502 of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Public Law 111-203), any publicly traded company will be burdened with preparing and submitting detailed reports to the SEC if its products contain the conflict minerals that include tin, tantalum, gold or tungsten that cannot be proven to be 'conflict-free.'

"The industry needs a reporting tool to deal with conflict minerals and we are fortunate to have the EICC/GeSI tool as a model," said Mark Frimann, co-chair of the IPC materials declaration task group. "IPC's open process for input will ensure that the final outcome [standard] will be useful to and adopted by the broader electronics industry."