An Independent Journal Dedicated to the Advancement of Chip - Scale Electronics January - February 2000 Email the editor

New Approaches to Testing Will Be Required

The new century will bring about signiÞcant advances in chip-scale electronics. Mobile computing and communications capabilities and the Internet will continue to drive the demand for smaller, more powerful electronic devices with more capabilities.

Advancing video and audio capabilities will increase the performance pressures on the chip sets used to power these electronic products, creating new challenges-as well as new opportunities-for the semiconductor industry.

Early in the next century, the test industry will confront challenges requiring solutions that address not only the technology, but economic feasibility as well. We've already seen an explosion in the growth of the multi-functional, mixed-signal automatic test equipment (ATE) systems addressing the unique requirements of testing system-on-a-chip (SC) devices. The economics of single insertion ATE however, are not favorable in every situation. For example, single-insertion testing of new multi-die packages that feature both ßash memory and logic will not be the most economically viable approach.

New approaches to testing will require the industry to break away from the traditional method of single-insertion test for all devices to a more distributed (or "partitioned") approach.

This will require that multi-insertion testing solutions be reviewed (including multi-site test and BOST) to determine which strategy makes the most sense from both an economic and technical standpoint.

This trend should gain momentum in the new century. Some projections place the SC/mixed-signal test market at 50 percent of an estimated $6 billion total ATE market in 2002.

This projection compares to the current estimate that SC/mixed-signal testers represent less than 40 percent of $3 billion total ATE sales today. To provide the test solutions for this type of high-growth market requires thinking outside of the box to take advantage of modern technologies that address the economic issues.

ATE companies will establish comprehensive testing resources and intellectual property programs from other industries, including the development of partnerships with companies on the periphery of the ATE industry-even those that may have been viewed as threats to ATE companies in the past.

The test companies that do not secure these resources will be left behind, unable to meet the demands of the marketplace.

In addition to incorporating the changes and advances expected in the new century, ATE companies must continue to focus on delivering test solutions in a timely manner.

Companies must also remain focused on cost-effectiveness,with the ultimate goal of delivering a compelling economic advantage to customers. -Graham Siddall, President and CEO, Credence Systems Corp.

Credence Systems Corp., Fremont, Calif., is a leader in the manufacture of automatic test equipment for the global semiconductor industry. Credence offers a wide range of products with test capabilities for digital, mixed-signal, and memory semiconductors. The company is listed on the Nasdaq National Market (CMOS).[credence.com]