Product Yield Management Service

Achieve Fast Yield Ramp With UMC's Product Yield Management Service

This effect begins with the development of UMC's advanced technologies with a Yield Enhancement Vehicle (YEV) and the use of DFM solutions. Product support including tape out review helps customers identify and address potential issues quickly. In addition, UMC fast yield feedback system and FA capability can accelerate product qualification and pilot run success. Together with an integrated wafer sort service, customers can confidently ramp to production and achieve stable manufacturing.

Three stages in product yield management service :

Stage 1 : Design and Tape-out

UMC's quality practices include the implementation of Failure Mode and Effect Analysis (FMEA) to ensure each customer's design success. This methodology identifies key milestones to target, including tape out success, timely wafer out, and fast production ramp-up. Key deliverables and gating items are assessed through criteria that range from Design Support Manual (DSM) readiness, device performance, and IP availability to reliability and package solutions. Resources are then committed and prepared to address each element so that a complete follow-through of the plan can be executed.

To ensure designs are built upon a robust process platform, UMC has also designed dedicated test vehicles for various process technologies. The vehicles include sophisticated VLSI designs such as RISC CPU, embedded memory, and parametric test structures. Design support for DFM and Scan Diagnostics implementation deliver accelerated first silicon verification and stable long-term yield.

UMC also performs a complete product tape-out review based on a comprehensive checklist, which includes items such as DRC and IP sanity check to ensure tape-out success.

Stage 2 : Pilot Run Success

To achieve pilot success in a timely fashion, UMC provides a variety of Design for Diagnosis (DFD) and product functional verification services that form a systematic approach to pilot silicon verification. The capabilities include Scan Diagnostics, IDDQ, bitmapping, and failure analysis.

UMC's system architecture knowledge enables rapid product debugging and functionality check to accelerate first silicon verification. Moreover, UMC's Fast Yield Feedback System offers real-time data feedback and test data monitoring to dramatically reduce the time to corrective action implementation.

The 24-hour online Engineering Data Analysis (EDA) System links in-line measurement and CP mapping to speed yield learning and analysis. The system features web tools capable of performing customized analysis within yield results, including composition map analysis to provide yield trend charts, bin map, and bin summary.

Figure 1. UMC's Design for Diagnostic (DFD) service flow is designed for fast yield ramp, as efficient analysis of silicon data is imperative for timely product introduction.

Figure 2. Fast Yield Feedback System greatly improves cycle time for data access.

Stage 3 : Production Yield Ramp

UMC has developed a powerful and efficient methodology for fast production yield ramp. Wafer sort data is uploaded in real-time to UMC's database for analysis, allowing corrective actions to be identified and implemented immediately. Customers can maximize the benefits of this continuous yield enhancement system by integrating the service with UMC's Wafer Sort Service, resulting in faster cycle time and optimized allocation of customers' engineering resources.

Figure 1. UMC's Design for Diagnostic (DFD) service flow is designed for fast yield ramp, as efficient analysis of silicon data is imperative for timely product introduction.

Figure 2. Fast Yield Feedback System greatly improves cycle time for data access.

Benefits of UMC Integrated Wafer Sort Service