I like to share the latest update of the SEMI effort regarding legacy FAB Automation Maturity. Dennis Xenos from Flexciton presented last week at the Innovation Forum in Dresden, Germany the latest results – there is now data from 9 FABs available: The complete presentation can be found below: 202601_Automation_MaturityDownload The team is still looking…… Continue reading Legacy FAB Automation Maturity – Update
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First of all I like to say thank you for the active participation. As we just saw at CES – humanoids are “really everywhere” – but it also seems there is a long way to go to see these comrades in real productive deployments. Here is the poll result: Based on this data about 50%…… Continue reading Humanoids in Wafer FABs – poll results
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As the activity and hype (?) around humanoids heats up there is one question lately in my mind: When will we see the first humanoid robots in wafer FABs in regular production ? Since the overall trend towards more generic robotic hardware is gaining traction the human form factor will fit of course very well…… Continue reading Humanoid Robots in Wafer FABs ?
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I recently run into a very nice article written by Jeff Winter – discussing the evolution of maintenance approaches. I thought it is absolutely worth sharing here. Thank you Jeff for giving me permission to do so. More interesting articles by Jeff can be found here:https://www.jeffwinterinsights.com/ Please see the article here: MaintenanceDownload
In the last 3 months there was a working group under the umbrella of SEMI working on a Maturity Framework – and the 1st results were presented at the SemiCon West last week in Phoenix, AZ. I had the opportunity to contribute to this work. The attempt is to give existing 200mm Wafer FABs an…… Continue reading Legacy FAB Automation Maturity Framework
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I like to thank everybody who participated in the survey in the recent weeks. The survey had 5 different focus areas:- 100/150mm Frontend FABs- 200mm Frontend FABs- 300mm Frontend Fabs – Assembly/Test/Backend- non semiconductor hight tech FABs Unfortunately, only the 200mm Frontend section got enough participation to assume that the results are statistically relevant. Not…… Continue reading Results of FAB Automation 2025 survey
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In a recent discussion with my colleague Wesley Capar – talking about FAB automation and what the overall situation in the current difficult business environment might be – we came up with the idea to ask YOU – the industry experts on your opinion. Since the situation is likely very different between state of the…… Continue reading State of Semiconductor FAB automation in 2025
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This post will be all about the advantages and capabilities of RFID based carrier tracking. But before I dive into this – here are the results from the poll from part 1: Based on this more than half of the legacy FABs have no complete location tracking of all carries in place. In my opinion…… Continue reading Importance of carrier location tracking – part 2
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To make it short: We had a blast ! The 22nd edition of the conference took place in Dresden, Germany last week and I had the honor to play an active part. Together with a few of my colleagues from Fabmatics Germany we hosted the break out session Test Wafers – the hidden GEMS in…… Continue reading Innovation Forum for Automation 2025
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Another super busy year went by like a breeze – and I like to wish all my readers a great Holiday Season and a good start into 2025. Speaking of 2025 – there will be 2 great conferences early next year which I plan to attend and I like to raise your interest. Innovation Forum…… Continue reading Good Bye 2024 – Hello 2025 !
I’m very happy to have another guest post to publish ! During the last SEMI Fab Owners Alliance (FOA) meeting in Portland, ME David Meyer, co-founder and CEO at Lynceus AI andAriel Meyuhas, COO and Founding Partner at MAX Group presented a very interesting approach using AI to improve equipment maintenance. I think this is…… Continue reading AI enabled precision maintenance
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When looking on the topic of improving Wafer FAB performance – the topic of lot and/or carrier tracking is often not in focus. For fully automated 300mm FABs this is really not an issue, because it is fully covered using RFID tags/pills on the FOUP and have any possible place where a FOUP can “sit”…… Continue reading Importance of carrier location tracking – part 1
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In the last few weeks I had the opportunity to visit a few of our (FABMATICS) customer FAB’s here in the US – sure enough the topic of test wafers and the options and benefits to automate test wafer handling came up in all of them. They all categorized themselves into the area of higher…… Continue reading Test Wafer, part 3
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First of all, thanks to everybody who participated in the test wafer usage poll in the last post. I received some decent feedback and below are the results: For 150 and 200mm FABs (based on 15 data entries) The data show that test wafers play a massive role in the day to day FAB business.…… Continue reading Test Wafer, part 2
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Inspired by the recent LinkedIn post from Fabmatics about the TestWaferCenter (LINK) I thought it is time to look a bit closer at the general topic of “test wafers”. So what are test wafers ? To keep it simple I will use the term “test wafer” for any non-product wafer in a FAB. Test wafers…… Continue reading Test Wafer , part 1
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The Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conference – short ASMC – will take place at a new venue this year. After many years in Saratoga Springs, NY this years conference will take place in Albany, NY. Conference registration is open now and the reduced early bid fee is available only until 04/01/2024 ! direct link to the…… Continue reading ASMC 2024
Amazing how fast another year went by. I want to use the opportunity to say THANK YOU to all the followers and readers of my block. 2023 was again a very dynamic and successful year. Lots of good interaction on the subject of Factory Physics and Automation. I wish you a great Holiday Season and…… Continue reading THANK YOU 2023
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Today I save a lot of time typing – since there is a great article on the topic – written by McKinsey and Company. As I have written about this topic in earlier posts – I can only recommend to read this piece as well: On a related topic, a good old friend and former…… Continue reading Maintenance and FAB productivity
Today I like to discuss another potential FAB performance detractor – time links or controlled queue time zones. These got introduced to the more advanced process flows to avoid negative impact from long queue times between different process steps. Typical reasons for controlling length of queue times between steps are possible unwanted oxidation or corrosion…… Continue reading Impact of “time links” or controlled queue times
What an event it was ! Critical Manufacturing organized on outstanding event – and I hope there will be a second one not too far in the future. About 500 experts met in Porto to discuss digitization and Industry 4.0 efforts. To me it was mind-blowing how much is going on in this area. A…… Continue reading MES & Industry 4.0 Summit in Porto, Portugal
Next years Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conference (ASMC) will take place in a new location. After many years in Saratoga Springs, NY ASMC 2024 will take place in Albany, NY. Every year over 400 experts from the semiconductor industry meet at the conference to discuss and exchange about manufacturing challenges. Due date for this years call…… Continue reading ASMC 2024 – call for papers
I’m usually writing here about Factory Physics and (soon) Factory Automation topics. One major aspect of both is to have good data to understand the behavior of your FAB. Modern FABs are extremely complex “eco systems” and operating at “best performance” possible needs fast access to the “right” data. Key for this is for sure…… Continue reading MES Summit in Porto, Portugal
Today just a quick heads up: next years Innovation Forum for Automation will take place in Dresden, Germany on January 25 -25. This year, there is a call for papers, so if you have an interesting project, problem or problem solution in the area of factory automation – the Innovation Forum could be a great…… Continue reading 2024 Innovation Forum for Automation
I just came back from the 2023 ASMC in Saratoga Springs, which was packed with 15 technical sessions and lots of great presentations. One topic was in the air throughout all the sessions – will the semiconductor industry have enough skilled operators, technicians and engineers ? Almost all keynotes brought this point up and there…… Continue reading Data is the new oil – or is it skilled workforce ?
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The Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conference in Saratoga Springs is just one month away ! I’m looking forward to meet many industry experts and discuss Factory Physics topics in person. Here are some of my personal Agenda highlights: Keynote: Salvatore Coffa from STMicroelectronics – Silicon Carbide Keynote: Thomas Sonderman from SkyWater Technologies – US Chips Act…… Continue reading ASMC 2023
Semiconductor manufacturing is a highly complex and dynamic industry that requires constant innovation and adaptation to meet the changing needs of customers. One of the biggest challenges in this industry is managing changes to the product mix, which can have a significant impact on the overall efficiency and effectiveness of the manufacturing process. Product mix…… Continue reading Product Mix and FAB performance
In todays post I will discuss the impact of rework on the overall FAB cycle time. Rework can happen for various reasons and at different process steps. Most common it occurs after a lot has been processed at a photo step. The picture below shows a typical scenario After a lot was processed at the…… Continue reading Rework and FAB cycle time
My last post closed with a poll on achieved M-ratio values. Here are the results: Unfortunately, not too many readers participated – so the statistics of the result are a bit weak. To some extend the data is reflecting my personal experience – what I have seen in various FABs. There is a significant amount…… Continue reading Equipment Uptime and FAB speed, part 3
To illustrate which uptime pattern from the last post might be more favorable I will add some tool utilization to the same 3 charts: the combined charts for the 3 scenarios are these: This example assumes that the productive usage every single day is a flat 80% of the total time, which is a very…… Continue reading Equipment Uptime and FAB speed, part 2
I like to resume with the posts on the topic of FAB cycle time drivers. As mentioned in an earlier post – these are some of the key drivers for factory cycle time: overall factory size (number of equipment available to run a certain step) overall equipment uptime and uptime stability M-ratio rework rate product…… Continue reading Equipment Uptime and FAB speed, part 1
It has been a while, but summer in upstate NY is too beautiful to not enjoy it as much as possible. Downside is (at least for the blog) – I spend less time on the computer to write new posts. So instead posting about Factory Physics and Automation topics, I do more of this: Kayaking…… Continue reading Summertime (Blog) Blues
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Last week I had the honor to present a keynote at the 19th Innovation Forum for Automation in Dresden, Germany. After 2 years of virtual conferences, this year it was a full in person event again. Here are the slides of my talk: 19th_innovation_forum_automation_talk_tbeeg_extDownload update: here are the video recordings of both days ( these…… Continue reading 19th Innovation Forum for Automation
Today only a super short post. If you have ever wondered, how many Semiconductor Wafer FABs are there – here is a great article on that topic from Daniel Nenni on SemiWiki: LINK
I did not discuss the results of the last poll yet. This post will focus on that. Unfortunately, not a lot of readers did participate. The data is statistically more on the weak side, but I think the outcome is in line with what I was expecting: It seems that 70% of the voters use…… Continue reading Fab cycle time and capacity planning
I recently attended the Advanced Semiconductor Manufacturing Conference (ASMC) in Saratoga Springs, NY and listened to a very interesting presentation. Bill Wiseman from McKinsey & Company spoke about the future of the US semiconductor ecosystem and a few fundamental challenges which will have significant impact. Bill is a longterm insider of the semiconductor business and…… Continue reading US Semiconductor Ecosystem Outlook
Happy Easter everybody ! Today only a very short post – since I’m discussing here normally how semiconductor FABs work in terms of cycle time and output, I thought why not have a quick look inside a FAB ? This post was triggered by a recent YouTube post of an Intel FAB walk, which nicely…… Continue reading View into a FAB
I received and interesting comment to one of the older posts: The topic is indeed very interesting. Most modern semiconductor processing equipment come with 4 load ports. Maine reason for that is to ensure the process chambers can be utilized as much as possible and do not have idle time because of exchange of lots.…… Continue reading Equipment load port utilization vs. FAB speed
In one of the earlier blog posts (LINK) I received interesting feedback on what are “acceptable” FAB cycle times. The results showed big differences and I think this is mainly based on voters professional experience. There are a lot of factors which influence a factories capability to achieve a certain cycle time. If we assume…… Continue reading Wafer FAB – size does matter !
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Thank you everyone who participated in the last poll. Participation was significantly down beside the fact, that there were plenty of post viewers. My interpretation is that the readers are not too sure about the actual value of 1 day of cycle time. This observation is also in line with my personal experiences from working…… Continue reading The value of 1 day of factory cycle time
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Today only a very short post ! Very interesting poll results ! Of course the poll left a lot of things open to free interpretation and assumptions, but as expected voters had different opinions. Here is the feedback chart: The same data in the context of the operation curve: If I ignore the outliers at…… Continue reading Chip shortage and FAB performance, part 3
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Reflecting on the wide spread of acceptable wait times and therefore acceptable FAB cycle times from the poll results, I was wondering: Why do people have these different opinions. I think it has to do with the actual factory conditions, the individual voters have experienced in their professional careers. To have fast cycle times is…… Continue reading Chip shortage and FAB performance, part 2
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I like to be open – I could not resist to use the trendy “chip shortage” term to generate some interest. Everything I will discuss in this post series is of course fully applicable even in times without a chip shortage. Let’s start with the results of my last poll: The spread of the answers…… Continue reading Chip shortage and FAB performance, part 1
here is the full bottleneck series as downloadable PDF file: post_bottlenecksDownload
Happy New Year ! This will be the last part of the Bottleneck discussion. As mentioned in part 3 – I think the most objective and telling indicator to see what is the true factory bottleneck is: highest average lot wait time at a tool group Wait time or cycle time in general is one…… Continue reading Bottlenecks, final part
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Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays ! I hope everybody is having a good time with friends and family and after a lot of good food is ready sit down and discuss more details about factory bottlenecks. In today’s post I will start zooming in on the 3 not grayed out metrics from the poll results…… Continue reading Bottlenecks, part 3
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A big thank you to everyone who voted in my little poll, here are the results: I kind of expected a picture like this – but what does this mean ? Here is my interpretation: Bottlenecks are widely known as the one thing one should work on 1st to improve the overall FAB performance. But…… Continue reading Bottlenecks, part 2
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Almost 15 years ago I had the opportunity to attend a 4 day seminar with the authors of the well known book “Factory Physics” LINK In the opening session we talked about what is limiting factory performance and sure enough bottlenecks came up. The question was asked , what can be done to improve a…… Continue reading Bottlenecks, part 1
Hello everybody, I finally decided to start my own blog. It will be all about – surprise – Factory Physics and Factory Automation Why am I doing this ? Over the years I had the chance to work very closely in different companies and their semiconductor factories and I found that especially in the non…… Continue reading Hello
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Factory Physics and Automation blog 