APEX Expo 2026 in Anaheim, California delivered exactly what the electronics manufacturing community needed: energy, investment, and momentum. For Data I/O, it was one of our strongest show appearances in recent memory, marked by meaningful conversations, a prestigious industry award, and growing excitement around where our unified programming platform is headed.
At the show, we showcased the full depth of our unified programming strategy, connecting semiconductor programming from design and NPI through volume production and beyond. Here’s a look at what made the show so memorable.
The highlight of the show came during the Circuits Assembly NPI Awards ceremony, where Data I/O was honored with the 2026 NPI Award in the Breakthrough in Electronics category for the LumenX2 platform. The award was presented by Mike Buetow, President of the PCEA (Printed Circuit Engineering Association), and accepted by our team at the show.
(Pictured left to right: Monty Reagan, William Wentworth, Jennifer Higgins, and Mike Buetow, President of the PCEA (Printed Circuit Engineering Association), who presented Data I/O with the recognition at APEX Expo in Anaheim.)
This recognition is an important validation of what the LumenX2 platform represents: next-generation programming performance designed for today’s most complex device requirements. The platform supports UFS, eMMC, microcontrollers, and secure elements, delivering fast verify speeds and tool-less changeovers that help manufacturers improve quality and reduce cost.
Read the full press release: Data I/O’s LumenX2 Platform Earns 2026 NPI Award for Breakthrough in Electronics Programming
Throughout the four-day show, visitors experienced the full breadth of our unified programming platform, firsthand how the same programming environment carries validated jobs from engineering and NPI directly into high-volume production without requalification.
Solutions on display included:
LumenX2-M4: Next-generation manual programmer with expanded device support and faster programming performance
LumenX-M8: Award-winning manual programmer for design and NPI
FlashCORE III-M4: Trusted performance and scalability for NPI and preproduction workflows
PSV Family: High-speed automated programming systems for volume production, including the PSV7000, delivering flexibility and scalability ideal for programming high-density UFS memory and PSV5000, ideal for low to medium volume applications.
ConneX: Software for MES integration, traceability, and process analytics
The conversations at the booth reflected a market in motion. As Bill noted in his interview with What’s New in Electronics, the quality of engagement at the show was higher than ever:
“The conversations have been much more meaningful. You can tell the climate’s changed a little bit, and people are investing again.”
On day two of the show, Bill Wentworth sat down with Cliff Saunders of What’s New in Electronics for a candid conversation about Data I/O’s transformation, the broader market climate, and what manufacturers can expect from us in the year ahead.
Bill shared that 2025 was a year of deliberate investment, even when the market slowed. “When things aren’t that busy, you can think through decisions, try them out, and not have a negative effect on the business,” he explained.
That investment extended to internal operations, including a significant push into AI-assisted software development that has accelerated bug resolution and improved productivity across the engineering team.
On the business model side, Bill previewed new service offerings expected to roll out in the coming months, including CapEx-based programming models and contractual revenue structures that give customers greater flexibility.
“That’s always been the game plan: CapEx, services, and programming at test. Those are the three major intersection points for data provisioning,” he said. His outlook for 2026: “This is the year for return to growth. I’m seeing clear line of sight to that.”
One of the most significant conversations happening at the show and across the industry is how to build security into electronic products from the earliest stages of design, rather than treating it as an afterthought in production.
Our recently announced collaboration with IAR, the global leader in embedded development software tools, directly addresses this need. By combining IAR’s expertise in embedded security definition with Data I/O’s proven semiconductor preprogramming technology, the two companies are delivering a seamless workflow that extends secure provisioning from embedded design all the way through mass production manufacturing.
This integration enables OEMs worldwide to:
As government regulations and industry standards increasingly mandate robust security measures for electronic products, this partnership fills a critical gap in the unified programming platform story, closing the loop between embedded design and production in a way that minimizes exposure to threat actors and protects intellectual property at every step.
Conversations at the show also generated real excitement around upcoming developments in our ConneX software platform. ConneX is the connective tissue of the unified programming platform, integrating with factory MES systems to enable real-time monitoring, job management, and end-to-end traceability across every stage of the supply chain.
We’re not ready to share all the details just yet, but a meaningful ConneX release is on the horizon, one that will bring deeper analytics, improved integration capabilities, and enhanced support for the security provisioning workflows we’re building with IAR. Stay tuned.
APEX Expo 2026 reinforced something we already believe: the manufacturers who invest in a unified programming platform, one that connects NPI to production, design to security provisioning, and manual to automated workflows, are the ones best positioned to compete in a fast-moving global market.
Thank you to everyone who stopped by, asked sharp questions, and helped make this one of our most engaging shows yet. The energy we felt in Anaheim is driving everything we’re building for the months ahead.
We’d love to continue the conversation.
Ready to see the unified programming platform in action? Connect with our team to schedule a demo or consultation and discover how a unified strategy can power your next product launch.