Automation Capabilities Management from FACTS

Unfortunately, a large number of semiconductor manufacturing tools still significantly under-perform to SEMI^® standards implementations for automation and they cannot meet the advanced automation capabilities required by many of today’s 300mm factories.

Automation Capabilities Management (ACM) Services from FACTS will accelerate equipment automation software conformance to relevant SEMI^® standards as well as the individual IC manufacturers’ operational needs.  ACM from FACTS can bring a new dimension of operational excellence to your wafer fab factory automation program.

 Tool owners need to stay focused on process characteristics and manufacturing goals.  Automation requirements for 300mm tools and equipment have grown far too complex and intricate for tool owners to manage.  Therefore, a dedicated team is needed to define, understand, and resolve automation issues both internally and with your suppliers.  With ACM from FACTS, individual tool owners no longer need to have an in-depth understanding of automation requirements or implementation details.

FACTS will provide you with the industries' most experienced ACM resource... the very same resources who helped “Write the Book” on ACM for the semiconductor industry.  ACM from FACTS will insure that the right level of functionality needed to implement your, and not your equipment supplier’s, automation strategy is delivered in the shortest possible time using a process that defines and then executes managed technical requirements.
 

What is Automation Capabilities Management

Simply stated, ACM is a methodology and process that has been proven to minimize the time required to achieve full production, factory automation capability.  ACM from FACTS will:

• Assist in the definition and development of your equipment automation requirements
   
• Communicate your equipment automation requirements to your equipment suppliers
   
• Establish an equipment supplier’s automation capabilities and limitations at the start of the procurement cycle, early enough to protect your automation deployment plan
   
• Proactively manage equipment supplier site-specific automation development activities
   
• Insure that an equipment supplier's automation deliverables conform to your technical procurement and operational requirements
   

What is the Value of ACM

ACM from FACTS provides:

• Clear and unambiguous technical specifications that suppliers, as well as your factory host-development teams, can use to derive testable requirements
   
• Fact-finding meetings that communicate your automation operational specification in such a way that your suppliers are an integral part of the procurement process
   
• Motivation for suppliers to prepare a more complete response to your specification requirements, thereby enabling quantitative comparisons between similar equipments
   
• Technical project management that will monitor and control suppliers’ site specific automation development projects
   
• A proactive dialogue with your supplier’s technical staff so that cost effective changes can be implemented when required
   
• Early cycle compliance verification testing, giving you maximum leverage for corrective action or early receipt of the equipment
   
• That the equipment interface (EI) development and deployment process can occur as early as possible in the equipment delivery cycle
   

Summary

If any of the following factory automation problems are continuing to detract from your investment in automation or from the value which full automation could be bringing to your fab, then let’s discuss what an ACM program from FACTS can do for you.

• Excessive time to get equipment automation functions “installed”
   
• Continued equipment automation deficiencies which must be managed over extended time periods until suppliers “get it right” through software upgrades, which further complicate equipment interface deployment
   
• Significant feature/function variance from vendor to vendor
   
• Different equipment functionality on the same tools from the same supplier because of different software revisions
   
• Real equipment technical limitations that constrain both equipment interface functionality and development schedules
   
• Constant upgrading of equipment software by your equipment suppliers, that requires changes to your equipment interface (EI) functionality and that makes tool software configuration management a significant issue

ACM Service Offering From FACTS

FACTS will provide your organization with an ACM activity that is specifically tailored to your unique needs, requirements, and budget.  From ACM program resource augmentation to designing and (through cooperation with our solutions partners) implementing an entire ACM program, FACTS is the only name you need to know for ACM and ACM related services.  At FACTS, we helped “Write the Book” for ACM.  ACM is not a sideline for FACTS.  Automation capabilities management and semiconductor equipment automation testing is all that we do, and we do it well.
 

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