Essential SMSs: developing a service management scheme for semiconductor factory management systems

A semiconductor factory contains hundreds of pieces of equipment. More reliable service by equipment managers is required to increase the utilization of equipment and improve product quality and yield. Therefore, developing a reliable service management scheme (SMS) for semiconductor factory management systems is essential. This study presents an SMS that applies Jini Technology and uses the design by contract technologies. The SMS has error-detecting and function-replacing capabilities. The SMS detects the malfunctioning of an equipment manager (service) and sends an event notice to the factory manager. The GEV in the SMS archives the credit values of all of the equipment managers so that the factory manager can select better equipment managers for service by checking their credit values. The illustrative example and the evaluation of the reliability improvement reveal that the proposed SMS provides an efficient, reliable, fault tolerant, and cost-effective mechanism for semiconductor factory management systems. Lastly, this illustrative example is successfully implemented and demonstrated and the core technology of SMS is transferred to and commercialized by Charming Systems Corporation.