News from Pintail Technologies

Paul van Ulsen Today, the role of the cell controller has been promoted to a new level of criticality in modern test operations. Several significant industry trends are driving new requirements that are best served by companies like Salland Engineering and Pintail. These trends include:

n Users want open software that provides a common interface that is independent of any ATE, prober or handler supplier.

n Increased variability in the silicon process raises new challenges for test.

n Increased variability in the test hardware must be neutralized.

n Emergence of adaptive testing based upon statistical process control methods open new opportunities for our entire industry.

Proprietary test cell controllers of the past will not longer represent "Best Practices" for the test industry.

Need for Open Systems: The number of combinations of interfaces required to allow various tester types to communicate with different probers or handlers is huge. None of the equipment vendors have done a good job of supplying such interfaces and internally developed proprietary solutions cost a great deal to maintain. Salland's business model is ideally suited to serve this market need.

Variability in the silicon: 300mm technology and sub-90nm processes are changing the rules by which we have historically achieved yield entitlement. We can no longer wait for post processing to report issues on wafers containing thousands of die. Adaptive test techniques are increasingly necessary to maximize yield during test and real-time data access to test results is becoming essential.

Variability of test equipment: The test environment itself contributes a large amount of the variability to modern test. In order to manage this, systems need to be in place that can track all aspects of the hardware used within a test cell. This includes being able to track ATEs, probers/handlers, probe cards, etc. by serial number.

Emergence of Adaptive Test: As stated above, one result of these trends is the need for on-line adaptive test methods. To accomplish this, real-time data from the tester must be processed on-line by sophisticated software. This software has the same need to be neutral to any equipment vendor in order to that users may standardize new test methods.

Salland's modern implementation of the dynamic cell controller clearly addresses these challenges. By using a commercially supported controller, interfaces to the various combinations of equipment will be better supported and more robust. Job control can be standardized more effectively across an organization. Interactivity with the user's MES can more easily be integrated.

Since the majority of the data required for adaptive test comes from the tester itself, the probers and handlers are inefficient vehicles to implement modern software solutions. Historic efforts to add intelligence to the Prober/Handler will become less important in the future.

Finally, as real-time data becomes more accessible via standard; tester interfaces like Pintail's SwifTest, intelligent test cell controllers will need to be in place to allow operations to immediately respond to real-time issues in order to maximize efficiency. Real-time database systems like Pintail's TestScape will magnify the issue of poor data integrity generated by incorrect information being entered at the tester. Salland's test cell controllers allow users to immediately fix their data integrity problems at the point they are first created. OEE systems will be able to generate the accuracy demanded of best-in-class test operations.

As always, we expect to improve our own solutions by integrating the ideas and recommendations we receive from our customers. We look forward to working with Pintail and our expanded joint customer base to deliver the very best in test solutions.