Optimal burn-in decision making

This paper presents a conceptual model of burn-in decision making which gives an optimal burn-in time for semiconductor devices and describes how burn-in affects total yield and reliability. For the gate oxide of integrated circuits we consider four burn-in policies: no burn-in, wafer-level burn-in only, package-level burn-in only and wafer-level burn-in prior to package-level burn-in. A decision-making model to minimize cost is given for each burn-in policy. Burn-in time is strongly limited by the cost factor and reliability requirements. In order to reduce the cost incurred in burn-in, a short test time and small test samples are recommended. Copyright © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.