The European project PROFIT: prediction of temperature gradients influencing the quality of electronic products

As the thermal community in Europe is relatively small compared to the US, research in this field is rather fragmented. Funding by the European Community (EC) makes a substantial impact in terms of helping to aggregate this fragmentation and build the critical mass necessary to realise a sound research program. On January 1, 2000, a new European project, called PROFIT, commenced as a kind of successor to the successfully finished EC-funded DELPHI, SEED and THERMINIC projects. PROFIT is aimed at creating methods and tools that enable sufficiently accurate measurement and prediction of temperature gradients in time and space, which is required for a more accurate and timely assessment of cost, performance, safety and reliability of electronic products in all stages of the product realisation process. This paper discusses its motivation, scope, objectives, advances over the state-of-the-art and the results achieved in 2000.