Test And Yield Management Converge

Learning how to improve IC-fabrication yields through analysis of production test can be extremely valuable. The combination of Synopsys’ Odyssey design-for-test (DFT) module and its TetraMAX automatic test-pattern generation (ATPG) tool can close the loop on manufacturing test and help ramp yields quickly.

The Odyssey yield-management software enables semiconductor manufacturers to correlate and analyze diverse datasets needed for product yield-enhancement. The TetraMAX automatic test pattern generation (ATPG) tool creates high-quality manufacturing tests and identifies logic in a design that could contribute to observed tester failures. When teamed together, TetraMAX failure-diagnostics data is exported to the Odyssey DFT module to facilitate comprehensive failure analysis and rapid yield improvement of fabricated devices.

Semiconductor foundries typically supply their fab-less IC houses with parametric data associated with the manufacture and testing of production parts, but until now there was little designers could do with the information to improve product yield. The combination of the Odyssey DFT module and TetraMAX enables designers to leverage the foundry-supplied data together with failure diagnostics accumulated from production runs (a capability often referred to as “volume diagnostics”) to help determine the root cause of yield loss.

For example, designers at NVIDIA Corporation and TranSwitch Corporation are using the Odyssey solution to correlate circuit-failure candidates reported by TetraMAX diagnostics with foundry-supplied information. Data mining and cross-correlation features in Odyssey assist designers in quickly determining both the impact of measured process parameters on product yield and whether failing parts are caused by systematic or random processes.

Contact Synopsys directly for pricing and delivery information.

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