Beam lead technology

Its initial application was for high-frequency silicon switching transistors and high-speed integrated circuits.

This technology eliminated the labor-intensive wire-bonding process that was commonly used for integrated circuits at the time.

It also enabled the automated assembly of semiconductor chips onto larger substrates, facilitating the production of hybrid integrated circuits.

Lepselter[2][3] developed techniques for fabricating a structure that involved electroforming an array of thick, self-supporting gold patterns on a thin film Ti-Pt-Au base, leading to the term "beams."

The beam lead devices, produced by the hundreds of millions, became the first example of a commercial microelectromechanical structure (MEMS).