Mass produced electronic circuit boards need to be manufactured in a highly mechanised manner to ensure the lowest cost of manufacture. The traditional leaded electronic components do not lend themselves to this approach. Although some mechanisation was possible, component leads needed to be pre- formed. Also when the leads were inserted into boards automatically problems were often encountered as wires would often not fit properly slowing production rates considerably.

Health care PCB SMT is used almost exclusively for the manufacture of electronic circuit boards these days. They are smaller, often offer a better level of performance and they can be used with automated pick and place machine that in many cases all bit eliminate the need for manual intervention in the assembly process.