Demand Grows For Reducing PCB Defects


Board manufacturers are boosting their investment in inspection, test and analytics to meet the increasingly stringent demands for reliability in safety-critical sectors like automotive. This represents a significant shift from the past, where concerns about reliability primarily targeted the devices connected to printed circuit boards. But as SoCs become disaggregated into advanced packages... » read more

Resolving Particle Issues In Photolithographic Scanners


Case Study: It’s essential to quickly identify the source of airborne particles in photolithographic scanners — both to coordinate and confirm the effects of cleanings and repairs. Regrettably, most traditional methods for detecting particles have trouble addressing particle issues proactively. Consider in-situ methods as an example. Conventional in-situ scanners do not provide access to... » read more

Momentum Builds For Advanced Packaging


The semiconductor industry is stepping up its efforts in advanced packaging, an approach that is becoming more widespread with new and complex chip designs. Foundries, OSATs and others are rolling out the next wave of advanced packaging technologies, such as 2.5D/3D, chiplets and fan-out, and they are developing more exotic packaging technologies that promise to improve performance, reduce p... » read more

Better Inspection, Higher Yield


Wafers can be inspected for large, obvious defects, or for small, subtle ones. The former is referred to as macro-inspection, while the latter is micro-inspection. These processes use different machines with different capital and operating costs, and they might look like competing approaches with different economic returns. In fact, they are complementary tactics that can be balanced within an ... » read more

NanoResolution MRS Sensor: Fast, Precise 3D Inspection And Measurement for Advanced Semiconductor Packaging Applications


The semiconductor packaging industry continues to advance, with new designs adding more layers, finer features and more I/O channels to achieve faster connections, higher bandwidth and lower power consumption. As packaging technologies have evolved, manufacturers have adapted old processes and adopted new processes to connect chips to each other and to the outside world. Often these new process... » read more

Week In Review: Manufacturing, Test


Market research What’s in store for the IC market in 2020 and 2021? Here’s the latest IC forecasts from IC Insights, Semico, Semiconductor Intelligence, WSTS and others. “We at Semiconductor Intelligence find it difficult to expect much of an increase in the world semiconductor market in 2020. However, the strength of the PC market and the relatively optimistic 3Q 2020 guidance of severa... » read more

Recovery In Flat-Panel Display Biz


The flat-panel display market is starting to recover after a period of oversupply and lackluster growth, fueled by new technologies as well as more people working from home. The flat-panel display market is complex. Several different technologies are at play, such as liquid-crystal displays (LCDs) for TV screens and other products, as well as organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) for smartph... » read more

Better Analytics Needed For Assembly


Package equipment sensors, newer inspection techniques, and analytics enable quality and yield improvement, but all of those will require a bigger investment on the part of assembly houses. That's easier said than done. Assembly operations long have operated on thin profit margins because their tasks were considered easy to manage. Much has changed over the past several years, however. The r... » read more

5G Brings New Testing Challenges


As 5G nears commercial reality, makers of chips and systems that will support 5G will need to take on the standard burden of characterizing and testing their systems to ensure both performance and regulatory adherence. Millimeter-wave (mmWave) and beamforming capabilities present the biggest testing challenges. “5G is expected to have the extended coverage plus the bandwidth to harness ... » read more

Case Study – Socket Metrology


From hours to seconds, the SQ3000 CMM optimized our customer’s backend inspection and socket metrology cutting cost and increasing yields for their high-volume manufacturing.Our customer was leveraging a Coordinate Measurement Machine (CMM) to handle the intricate measurements required for their socket metrology, semiconductor jigs and mobile phone sensors. Click here to continue reading. » read more

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