The Best Papers from SMTA International 2017 winners have been announced.  The winner from SMTA International 2017 for the Rich Freiberger Best of Conference Award, as selected by the conference attendees, is Chrys Shea, Shea Engineering Services, for her presentation entitled "Solder Paste Qualification Testing for EMS Production." The corresponding research and published paper was co-authored by Ray Lawrence, 4Front Solutions. The award is reportedly based on the conference attendees' rating of each speaker at the technical session.

Andre Delhaise from Celestica received the Best of Proceedings category for the paper "Effect of Thermal Treatment on the Microstructure, Properties, and Reliability of Lead-Free Bismuth Containing Solder Alloys." Jeff Jennings, Harris Corp., came in second for the paper “Moisture Effects in Common Solderable RF Connector Dielectrics Part II: Characterization of Damage Threshold Moisture Level for Moisture Sensitive Polymers.” Christian Schwarzer from Fraunhofer ISC took third place for his paper “Investigation of the Influence of Voids on the Reliability of Solder Joints by the Finite Element Method.”