Pick and place is a technique used in surface-mount technology to place components onto a printed circuit board. Also known as SMT component placement systems, pick and place machines are capable of mounting a variety of electronic components onto circuit boards quickly and precisely. Resistors, capacitors, integrated circuits and other components can be mounted quite easily using pick and place machines. These machines provide applications for industries such as industrial equipment, consumer electronic goods, computers, medical instruments, military systems, and many more.

There are many complicated gadgets involved in pick and place machines. They contain a nozzle for pneumatic suction, a conveyor belt to hold the printed circuit boards before they have been added to, tape reels in order to hold the components and many more. There are also optical stations that will determine whether or not the correct component has been picked, as well as make sure it is at the correct angle. Solder paste and other adhesives can be used for mounting components to the printed circuit board, but this is only temporary.

Pick and place machines are placed in an assembly line, with two machines arranged in a sequence. To start, the board is fed into a rapid-placement machine, which will take low-precision package components like capacitors and place them on the printed circuit board. The machine is built around a turret, which spins and permits components to be picked up by stations as they pass the machine, provided to them by tape feeders. The station then moves around the turret, placing it in an exact position while an optical station determines the angle at which to pick up the part. The machine compensates for the drift that occurs as the turret continues to spin, and as the station moves directly in front of the turret, the nozzle of the machine is spun and captures the part at the exact angular orientation. Finally it is placed onto the board, completing this pick and place process.

The technique utilized by pick and place machines has had to pick up its pace in recent years. Due to new industry standards, the limited abilities of rapid-placement machines have had to be replaced with something that can live up to the word "rapid", and replaced with something faster and more efficient. Since the cost of using two machines per pick and place function is so high, all other costs should be as limited as possible. A multi-headed machine has replaced the standard model mentioned above in order to provide more speed. This allows the heads to be swapped quickly so that malfunction rate is low and the pick and place machines can continue to do as much work as possible.

As far as surface mount technology goes, pick and place is an essential. These machines allow the user to place electronic parts onto a circuit board to allow its functionality. Though pick and place is an expensive process due to the necessity for two machines, costs are cut down through the elimination of inadequate or less than ideal components. By firmly connecting components, pick and place machines assure that printed circuit boards are ready to go.