Electrostatic-Discharge Awareness & Control ߝ An R&M 2000 Issue

As weapon systems become more sophisticated to meet multiple complex hostile threats, there will be an increasing reliance upon a high density of analog and digital microelectronic components, modules, and subsystems. Hybrid microelectronics are moving toward submicron geometries for semiconductor components, multilayer interconnects, and higher component densities on larger area substrates. This miniaturization increases the susceptibility of microelectronic circuitry to electrical overstress (EOS) and electrostatic discharge (ESD). Since EOS and ESD directly affect reliability and maintainability, procedures must be developed to account for them in engineering design, manufacturing, and testing. Over the past several years, there has been a concerted effort to raise ESD awareness at all levels of design and production at Motorola and other electronic firms. This paper briefly describes what measures should be considered and presents examples of their implementation at Motorola to increase reliability, lower costs, and reduce maintainability factors.