This paper illustrated the beauty of AFP nano-probing as the critical failure analysis tool in localizing new product design weakness. A 40nm case of HTOL Pin Leakage due to Source/Drain punch-through at a systematic location was discussed. The root cause and mechanism was due to VDS overdrive testing issue. This paper placed a strong emphasis on systematic problem solving approach, deep dive and use of right FA approach/tool that are essentially critical to FA analysts in wafer foundry since there is always minimal available data provided. It would serve as a good reference to wafer Fab that encountered such issue.

Fault isolation and failure analysis for Si related issues in microelectronic packages need non-destructive and high resolution techniques to reduce the analysis time. This paper illustrates non-destructive and high resolution CSAM techniques, which are shown to be very effective in subtle thin film defect and die edge defect CSAM imaging.

This paper describes a sample preparation methodology for Trench Power MOSFET that significantly improved our failure analysis success rate for trench bottom defect. With precise fault localization and subsequent a unique physical failure analysis using parallel polishing method on Trench Power MOSFET, This enabled defect detection from the trench top to the trench bottom.

The 3D package configuration presents challenges to conventional Fault Isolation (FI) and Failure Analysis (FA) methods. This paper illustrates that with correct Electro Optical Terahertz Pulse Reflectometry (EOTPR) data processing, interpretation and additional reference spectra, the combination of EOTPR to isolate the open/high resistance failure location and 3D X-ray Computed Tomography (CT) to image the failure is very effective for System in a Package (SIP) FI/FA.