Catch the Wave
New initiatives call for more standards.
By Paul Trio, Director, Standards, SEMI
While some stadium events have reportedly caused minor earthquakes, Moscone Center created waves of its own with SEMICON West 2023 last July. Drawing well over 16,000 attendees, the event focused on key challenges affecting the global microelectronics industry featuring a daily CEO Summit and programs centered around three key industry priorities: Path to $1T, Path to Net Zero, and Path for Talent.
The North America Standards Meetings were also held in conjunction with SEMICON West with nearly 60 technical committees and task forces taking place during the week. SEMI Standards celebrates its 50th anniversary this year including a featurette celebration video premiered at the Standards Awards Ceremony & Networking Event. At the ceremony, we honored Standards volunteers for their important contributions and exemplary dedication to the Program, but it was also an opportunity to reflect on our rich history – including the pioneer volunteers who paved the way – as well as a call to action for our workforce of tomorrow.
We launched new Standards efforts at SEMICON West, including the formation of a dedicated North America (NA) Technical Committee Chapter for Flexible Hybrid Electronics (FHE). The NA Metrics TC Chapter approved two new activities focused on measuring particles and contamination by Liquid Particle Counter (LPC) of critical chamber components as well as measuring surface contamination by particle concentration through replacement substrate and optical metrology. The NA EHS TC Chapter approved a revision activity on SEMI S8 (Ergonomics) including updates to material handling assessment, controls allowing for various postures, manual hand crank criteria, cleanroom glove strength, assessment documentation as well as changes to various parts of the SESC Checklist. Lastly, just before West, the NA Information & Control Committee approved new activities proposed by the Equipment Data Publication (EDP) Task Force (TF) including a Primary Standard defining common infrastructure that new Equipment Data Publication Subordinate standards will use to outline specific content data for component types (e.g., etch component, vacuum pumps, chillers, etc.). Subordinate standards on common data for etch components as well as vacuum components will also be developed under the EDP TF.
New SEMI initiatives were also kicked off last July including the launch of the Advanced Packaging and Heterogeneous Integration (APHI) Technology Community. The APHI community aims to drive awareness, adoption and interoperability of advanced packaging and heterogeneous integration technologies. Consisting of industry, academic and government experts, the group met to begin to define the APHI Technology Community vision and mission, including its pre-competitive focus and commitment to educating members and supporting global APHI technology development.
While our 3D/Packaging, Traceability, Equipment Automation & Automation Technology Standards are helping enable these capabilities, there remains a need for further industry collaboration to develop more standards in this space.
A Global Cybersecurity Forum was also held during SEMICON West featuring keynotes from Intel and TSMC as well as speakers from Applied Materials, ASML, Lam Research, PEER Group, and NIST. The session highlighted cybersecurity status, risks, impacts as well as a call to action to collaborate together in protecting our semiconductor industry. With plans to launch a dedicated SEMI initiative on cybersecurity, an initial discussion among industry stakeholders was held later in the week reinforcing the need to share cyber threat information & learnings, leverage existing industry platforms, and drive adoption & implementation of SEMI cybersecurity standards.
With our sights set towards a $1T industry, we welcome these waves of new initiatives and standardization activities to overcome several challenges, both emerging and persistent. And if our 50 -year history has taught us anything, we will need a strong standards workforce to keep our industry moving forward.
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September 14, 2023