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Modern reliability assurance of integrated circuits—A strategy based on technology capability assessment and production reproducibility control
Author(s) -
Gerling W.
Publication year - 1991
Publication title -
quality and reliability engineering international
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.913
H-Index - 62
eISSN - 1099-1638
pISSN - 0748-8017
DOI - 10.1002/qre.4680070404
Subject(s) - reliability engineering , reliability (semiconductor) , new product development , manufacturing engineering , product (mathematics) , computer science , pace , process (computing) , production (economics) , risk analysis (engineering) , engineering , systems engineering , business , power (physics) , physics , geometry , mathematics , geodesy , marketing , quantum mechanics , economics , macroeconomics , geography , operating system
Technological innovations provide integrated circuits of increased functionality and complexity, and modern design tools facilitate a new multiplicity of products, such as application‐specific products (ASICs). Traditional qualification procedures cannot keep pace with this evolution with respect to requirements of product reliability, ability of qualifying the multiplicity of future products, and market demands for saving cost and time. A further development of a reliability assurance concept, which will be discussed here, considers design tools, basic product elements, materials, manufacturing process and controls as a ‘system’, which has to be qualified with respect to the consistency and efficiency of all of the implemented reliability assurance measures. The concept is based on the manufacturer's ‘system’ knowledge and responsibility. It is compatible with the relevant requirements of ISO 9000 and recent military standard proposals. The procedure is applied to commercial products. The main part of this concept is the qualification of the manufacturing technology. The procedure is organized as a continuous process starting at the concept phase of a new technology and its pilot product. The various steps then follow the development, the pre‐series and series production phases. The reliability aspects concentrate on the physical properties of product elements relevant to their stability and endurance, i.e. the potential failure mechanisms and their root causes as reliability risks. Thus a major part of reliability testing for the qualification of the pilot product of a new technology can be performed without the use of the final product version. The benefits derivable from this approach are savings in time and cost as well as the capability to handle future product multiplicity.